Matthias Court has 3 large recycling bins: 2 for paper & card and 1 for mixed use (primarily glass and plastics). There is also a smaller green recycling bin (food waste). All the recycling bins are located opposite the garage roller shutter entrance.
There materials you can put in the bins is summarised on the council website
Please avoid ‘contamination’ of the recycling bins: For recycling, it’s important the appropriate items are place in the correct bins i.e. do not push plastic bottles in the paper & card recycling bins OR do not put cardboard in the glass & plastics recycling bin. Serco, the operator, does check the contents of the bins and if they see evidence of the wrong items in the wrong bin, they will refuse to collect it.
Please do NOT put polystyrene packaging in the mixed use recycling bin. It is not considered plastic because polystyrene breaks apart easily and clogs the sorting machinery. You should either dispose of this in one of the ground floor bin rooms (outside the ground floor entrance door on the walkway). If Serco finds polystyrene in a recycling bin before they empty it, they will label the bin ‘contaminated’ and refuse to collect it on their Tuesday recycling collection.
Please do NOT overfill the recycling bins: As these bins have to be mechanically lifted up to be tipped into the rubbish trucks, if they are too full, Serco will refuse to collect them simply because the contents start falling out as the bin is mechanically raised. If a recycling bin is already completely full, either wait until the following week, or manually place the item into the bin in a ground floor bin room (outside the ground floor entrance door on the walkway).
Please no NOT leave loose items next to the recycling bins because Serco will not pick them up. They will leave them there.
Recycling collections: These take place weekly on a Tuesday morning (usually from 07.00 onwards)
Regular bin room collections: These take place weekly on a Wednesday (usually from 09.30 onwards).
Book a ‘Bulky Collection’ and the Council will collect it from Matthias Court
For those of you who have booked ‘bulky collections’ with other Councils, Richmond is no different in that they require a clear itemised list of what is to be collected.
This is an efficient way to get rid of unwanted items, particularly if you are e.g. moving out of a rented flat, or decluttering your flat.
If you have your own transport, you can book an appointment and drop it off yourself at the Townmead Dump.
If you have a car, you can book online
If you want to raise a question, you can contact the Recycling team directly on recycling@richmond.gov.uk.
Bin chutes are located in the bin room (next to the lift) except on the Ground floor. Please note that (i) rubbish should be wrapped in a plastic or paper bag, and (ii) the bag must be small enough to fit into the chute. Every year, at least one chute gets blocked because someone puts a bag or materials into the bin chute which blocks it. In 2024, a total of £753 was spent on 3 blocked chutes. It’s just careless behaviour where someone can’t be bothered to dispose of their rubbish correctly and pushes something which is too big into the chute.
Please do not dump cardboard/packaging down the bin chute. This often unfolds in the bin chute and blocks it. Cardboard should be disposed of in the recycling bins located opposite the garage roller shutter entrance.
Please ensure that if contractors are doing work on your flat, that they have been told NOT to throw building waste down the bin chutes. There have been cases of paint pots being thrown down the bin chutes. These can either block the bin chute and can plastic paint pots can crack and leaves paint dripping into the bin rooms.
If you discover a bin chute is blocked, please do not use it and report the blockage on FixFlo.
