IS the city council in chaos? By posing this question it’s obvious to me - following its failure to deliver a garden waste bin in three months, despite chasing it - that it is. 

My frustrations started when, in December, I ordered and paid for a garden waste bin on behalf of the residents of a small development whom I represent as chairman of its management company.  It’s now mid-March and we’re still waiting for the bin.  I started chasing by phone almost three weeks ago and in the process, here’s what I’ve discovered: 

  • In the garden waste department, no records are kept of the status on taxpayer’s queries, so both parties must always start from scratch; 
  • I’ve spoken to four staff members, one of whom should never have been put in a customer-facing role, so uninterested was she in helping;
  • Every time I’ve rung, staff have struggled to find my address which is strange bearing in mind its simplicity.  When pointing out that council tax bills find me easily enough, I learned that WCC use more than one database of taxpayers, which is confusing and inefficient;
  • Nobody answering the phone in the garden waste department has any authority to contact the bin supplier (Biffa?) directly, demurring instead to some operations department where, it would seem, our bin is stuck. This too is inefficient;
  • Payment records are poor.  One staff member concluded I hadn’t yet paid but I confirmed that I had the payment receipt generated in December, that the money left my account immediately and that I’d already received the bin’s sticker;
  • I've found the council website to be poor – it’s slow and has a poor search facility; 
  • When I rang the WCC, the call was answered by someone who didn’t know the names of either the chief executive or the mayor.  That rings alarm bells too. 

I have written to the chief executive, copying our mayor and the council leader to point out the shambles.  Even though all I really want is the garden waste bin I ordered and paid for almost three months ago, I do think it raises this question: are Winchester residents being poorly serviced by the city council?

Graham Tillotson,

Chilbolton Avenue,

Winchester