What affects the cost of waste disposal

Waste disposal is one of those services where two quotes for what sounds like the same job can look nothing alike, and the reason is almost always that they are not the same job. This explains what sits inside the number, so you can read a quote and know which parts you can change.

What you are actually paying for

Three separate costs are bundled into one figure. Knowing which is which explains most of the differences you will see.

1. 1

   The trips

   A lorry, a driver and fuel, twice: once to set the bin down and once to lift it away. A skip-bin job is always two trips, which is why anything that surcharges a trip counts twice.

2. 2

   The disposal

   What it costs to tip the load at a licensed facility, charged by weight. This is the part that varies most between two bins of the same size.

3. 3

   The rental

   The bin itself, standing on your site and not on anybody else's. Each bin includes the rental days quoted with your bin; beyond that an extra-day rate applies.

The six things that move the price

Weight is the biggest lever

This is the part most people are surprised by. Because disposal is charged by the tonne, the same bin can carry very different costs depending on what goes into it.

A bin of sofas, cardboard and timber is light. The same bin filled with broken tiles, concrete or wet soil can weigh several times as much while looking no fuller. That is why a contractor stripping a bathroom and a family clearing a flat get different answers for the same size of bin.

Out of hours, Sundays and public holidays

We run every day of the year, and the surcharge for it is one flat figure: S$50.00. It applies to a trip that is outside normal working hours, or on a Sunday, or on a gazetted public holiday.

Two details are worth knowing. The charge applies once per trip, not once per reason — a Sunday evening delivery carries it once, not twice. And because a skip-bin job is two trips, a late delivery and a late collection each carry it, while a single-visit collection can only ever carry one.

If the timing is flexible, moving a trip into normal hours on an ordinary weekday is the simplest saving available on any job.

GST, and what a quoted figure includes

Skyline Environmental is GST-registered, at 9%. Every figure we publish or quote already carries it — the price you are told is the price you pay, not a subtotal with tax to be added at the end.

When you compare quotes, check that the other figure is on the same footing. A number quoted before tax will always look smaller than one quoted after it.

How to get a figure that does not move

A price that changes after the bin is delivered is the thing everybody is guarding against, on both sides. It is avoided by describing the job accurately once, at the start.

1. Say what the waste is, not only how much. “A flat clear-out” and “a bathroom strip-out” fill the same bin and weigh very differently.
2. Give the address or the postal code and the type of property. Access is decided by the site, not by the job.
3. Say where the bin would stand, and whether that is private property or a public road.
4. Give both dates, or say that the collection date is open and we will set it when you call.
5. Send a photo. One picture of the pile or the driveway settles more questions than a paragraph.

With those five things we reply with a fixed figure for exactly that job, and it does not change after delivery. You can see what we charge for each bin, book online with your own dates, or ask us for a quote if the job is unusual.

Booking online opens dates from 3 days ahead. Anything sooner we take by phone, because an urgent job is confirmed by hand against that day's schedule rather than promised by a form.