How we check every listing

Tip Times lists household waste recycling centres with the details you need before loading the car: opening times for summer and winter, bank holidays, whether you must book, van and trailer rules, residency checks, what each site takes and turns away, and charges for DIY waste. This page explains where those facts come from and how much to trust them.

Sources: council and operator pages only

Every fact comes from a page published by the council that runs the tip, by its waste authority, or by the contractor that operates the site for it. We do not copy times from map apps, review sites or other directories. Today the listings draw on 9 different websites.

The list of possible sites starts from OpenStreetMap, which records where recycling centres are. Council areas come from the Office for National Statistics. A site only gets a page when a council page describes it.

Checked word for word, then checked again

For each fact we keep the passage it was taken from. A fact is used only if that passage appears on the council's page exactly as published. A second, independent check then reads only the fact and its passage, and the fact is dropped unless that check agrees the passage supports it. We keep that evidence in our records; the listings show the details in plain form, with a link to the source and the date we checked it.

Summer and winter times

Many tips change their times between summer and winter, often when the clocks change. Where a council gives seasonal times, the listing shows both and marks the one in force today. Where a council lists only one set of times, we show that set.

Dates and re-checks

Every fact shows the day we read its source. The current listings were checked between 19 Oct 2026 and 19 Oct 2026. Source pages are re-checked every week and a page whose content has changed is read again before its listing is updated. If a listing has not been confirmed for more than 120 days, it shows a warning and is removed from search engine indexes until it is checked again.

When sources disagree

Sometimes two official pages give different times or charges for the same site, for example a council overview page and the site's own page. We never pick one silently: the listing says so, shows what each one says, links both and asks you to check before you travel. Right now 8 listings carry a note like this.

What gets published

A site appears only when its opening times come from an official page checked recently and at least one more detail, such as booking rules, vehicle rules, residency checks, accepted items or charges, is confirmed as well. Sites that do not meet that bar are left out rather than shown with guesses. Listings with fewer than 300 words, or too little data of their own, stay available to visitors but are kept out of search indexes. Today the guide has 58 listings in 5 council areas and 589 individual facts.

Limits

Councils change times for holidays, weather and staffing, and booking slots fill up. A listing can only be as current as its source page and our last check, so treat it as a strong starting point and check the council's page before a long trip. If you spot something out of date, the contact page reaches us directly.