Sutton Bin Collection Days: Check Yours, Brown Is Rubbish

Sutton bin collection runs on a mixed rhythm that catches out almost everyone who moves into the borough: food waste every week, but three separate fortnightly rounds for everything else. If you have just arrived in Sutton, Cheam, Carshalton, Wallington or Worcester Park, or you can never remember whether this is a green bin week or a box week, this is the page to bookmark. Below is how to find your day, exactly what belongs in each container, what garden waste and bulky collections cost in 2026, and what happens over bank holidays. Every figure comes from the London Borough of Sutton’s own pages.

How to find your bin collection day in Sutton

The council runs a free address lookup. Enter your postcode and pick your house, and it returns your rubbish, recycling, food waste and garden waste dates.

• Start at the council’s check your bin collection days page, which sends you into the Sutton waste services lookup.
• You can also download a printed annual collection calendar for your address using the council’s calendar request form, linked from the same page.

Whatever day you are given, one rule governs everything: containers out before 6am on collection day. Put them at the edge of your property, close to the pavement but not on it, and make sure they can be seen easily from the road (presenting your bins correctly).

Two more presentation rules trip people up. Your food caddy handle must be left in the locked position, and your wheelie bin lid must be shut with the handle facing the road. Bins are collected from the named street of your address only, never from the side or rear of a property.

The Sutton bin collection timetable for 2026, and how to get yours

There is no borough-wide printable timetable, and there cannot be one, because Sutton’s rounds vary by street on two separate axes: which weekday you are on, and which of the two alternating fortnights your street sits in. What the council does give you, and almost nobody uses, is a calendar feed for your exact address that runs three months ahead.

Once you have picked your address in the waste services lookup, the address page carries a “Add to your calendar” link. That link is an .ics subscription file. Point your phone or desktop calendar at it once and every collection date arrives automatically, refreshed daily, with no download to reprint when the schedule changes. It is the closest thing to the annual timetable people go looking for, and it is more accurate than a printed one because it updates.

There is also a “Download PDF waste calendar” button on the same page if you want the printable version, and an “Add to your home screen” option that pins the address page like an app.

What a real Sutton timetable looks like

We pulled the calendar feed for addresses across the borough on 6 September 2026. This is a houses round in Carshalton, and it shows the pattern cleanly:

Two things the pattern above will not tell you about your own street

Your neighbours on the same weekday can be on the opposite fortnight. We checked two Carshalton addresses, both on Tuesday rounds. One had its brown bin out on 8 September, the other on 15 September. So knowing that a friend two postcodes away puts the brown bin out this week tells you nothing about your own street. Only the address lookup does.

Flats are on a different service entirely. At the blocks we checked, the communal arrangement is weekly rubbish and weekly mixed recycling, not fortnightly, and there is no separate paper and card round at all: paper goes in with the rest of the recycling. At one Wallington block the food waste day was a Tuesday while the rubbish and recycling came on the Friday, so the two are not even on the same day. If you live in a block, do not read the houses pattern across.

What goes in each bin in Sutton

Sutton uses four containers at houses, and the colour coding is not what people expect from other boroughs. In Sutton the brown wheelie bin is general rubbish, not garden waste, and the green wheelie bin is paper and card. Get those two the wrong way round and your bin will be left behind.

The two recycling streams fall on alternate weeks, so in any given week you are putting out food waste plus one of them. All of this is set out on the council’s your collection service page for houses.

Food waste, collected weekly

You get a small indoor kitchen caddy and a larger outdoor caddy with a lockable lid. In go all uneaten food and plate scrapings, fruit and vegetable peelings, cooked and raw meat, chicken, fish and bones, rice, pasta and beans, bread, cakes and pastries, cheese and eggs, tea bags and coffee grounds, and cut flowers.

What the crews will not take is plastic bags, packaging of any kind, liquids such as milk, oil or liquid fat, and garden waste. Line the kitchen caddy with compostable liners or old newspaper, never a plastic bag.

Paper and card, in the green bin

Newspapers, magazines, card and cardboard, toilet and kitchen roll tubes and egg boxes, all clean, dry and flattened. Keep out plastic bags, food-stained cardboard such as greasy pizza boxes, drinks cartons, tissue paper, and shredded paper unless it is bagged in a paper bag or envelope.

Plastics, glass, cans and cartons, in the box

Plastic bottles, pots, tubs and trays, glass jars and bottles, cans, tins, aerosols and tin foil, and food and drink cartons, all rinsed. Plastic bags, plastic film and rigid plastics such as toys and plant pots do not belong here.

General rubbish, in the brown bin

Non-recyclable rubbish, wet or dirty cardboard, plastic bags and film, polystyrene and nappies. Electrical items, batteries, gas canisters, DIY waste and hazardous waste are all excluded. One general waste bin per household is collected, and side waste is not taken.

Small electricals, batteries and textiles have their own free service: the council’s small items recycling collection is booked online and collected from your doorstep.

Garden waste in Sutton costs £99 a year

Garden waste is not covered by your council tax. It is a separate annual subscription, and nothing is emptied until you have joined and paid.

• The subscription is £99 per bin per year, and you can have as many bins as you need (sign up for garden waste collection).
• You get 24 fortnightly collections across the subscription year.
• Bins arrive within 10 days of payment, and your subscription year officially starts on the day of your first collection.
• The garden waste bin itself, a green wheelie bin with a brown lid, is supplied free with the subscription (waste container charges).

The service takes a four week break over the festive period, from Wednesday 6 January 2027 to Sunday 31 January 2027, resuming on Monday 1 February 2027. The council’s reason is practical: garden waste volumes collapse in midwinter, and the crews are redeployed onto the extra recycling and rubbish generated over Christmas, including Christmas tree collections.

Replacement bins are no longer free

Since April 2026 the council charges an administration and delivery fee for most replacement containers. The bin remains council property; the fee covers processing and delivery, and it is non-refundable.

Three containers stay free: the 23 litre outdoor food caddy, the 7 litre kitchen caddy, and the garden waste bin supplied with a subscription. If a crew lost or damaged your bin you can claim a free replacement, but the council requires photo or video evidence before accepting the claim.

Bulky waste collections

For furniture and appliances too big for a bin, the council collects up to six items per booking, each liftable by two people.

• £49 for one to three items, £81.80 for four to six.
• Upholstered seating containing persistent organic pollutants is priced separately at £74 for one to three items and £122.70 for four to six.

Items must be outside by 6am, visible and accessible from the road, with nothing left inside them. Crews collect between 6am and 6pm and will not enter homes, back gardens, garages or sheds. Bookings cannot be changed once paid, and cancelling does not get you a refund (book a bulky item collection).

Plenty of things are excluded, including rubble, plasterboard, paint, tyres, sheds, greenhouses, radiators and garden waste. Those go to the Household Reuse and Recycling Centre at Kimpton Park Way instead, which you must book a slot to visit. It sits outside the town centre car parks covered in our guide to parking in Sutton.

Bank holidays and Christmas

Sutton does not publish a single standing rule that shifts every collection back a day around bank holidays, and the reason turns out to be simpler than it looks: on the evidence of the council’s own lookup, the borough does not run household collections on a Monday at all.

We queried the council’s waste services lookup for 48 addresses spread across the borough on 31 August 2026, the summer bank holiday itself, and read the rubbish round off each one. Not one was a Monday:

Every one of those 48 addresses was also showing its normal weekday for the week containing the bank holiday: Tuesday rounds on Tuesday 1 September, Wednesday rounds on Wednesday 2 September, Thursday rounds on Thursday 3 September, Friday rounds on Friday. Nothing had been pushed back a day.

What that means in practice. Most English bank holidays fall on a Monday, and a borough with no Monday rounds has nothing to move, which is why Sutton publishes no standing one-day-later rule the way neighbouring councils do. For the summer and spring bank holidays you can take your normal day as read. Christmas and New Year are the genuine exception, because those dates fall on ordinary weekdays and the council issues a separate festive calendar each December.

This is a sample rather than the whole borough, so if your own street is on a Monday round we would like to know, but the reliable check is always the council’s address lookup, which shows your actual dates.

Getting the timetable itself

The lookup does more than show the next few dates, which is what most people miss. Once you have picked your address it offers three ways to keep the whole schedule:

• Download PDF waste calendar, which is the printable annual timetable people go looking for.
• Add to your calendar, which feeds the dates straight into a phone or desktop calendar so they arrive without you checking.
• Add to your home screen, which pins the address page as an app-style shortcut.

The same page also gives you the last collection with the actual time the crew logged it, down to the minute, which settles most arguments about whether a round has been past yet.

What is published in advance is the recycling centre. Kimpton Park Way opens 9am to 5pm on other bank holidays, 9am to 12pm on Christmas Eve, and closes on Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day. Normal hours are 9am to 5pm Monday to Saturday and 9am to 2pm on Sunday. The one fixed festive change to collections is garden waste, which pauses for four weeks from 6 January 2027.

If your bin is missed

Crews will not return for a bin that was put out after 6am, contained the wrong materials, or was too heavy. If none of that applies, wait until after 6pm on your collection day, because rounds run until then, and only report it if it is still there.

Report a missed collection through the council’s report a missed collection page. Missed collections must be reported within two working days, and the council aims to send a crew back within two working days. Leave the bin out at the front of the property while you wait.

If your bin store or refuse arrangements are changing because of building work at your address, the proposals will be on the borough’s public register, which we cover in our guide to Sutton planning applications. More Sutton local information is on the Sutton Online home page.

Frequently asked questions

How do I check my bin collection day in Sutton?

Use the council’s check your bin collection days lookup and enter your postcode and address. It returns your rubbish, recycling, food waste and garden waste dates, and you can request a printed annual calendar from the same page.

Where do I get the Sutton bin collection timetable for 2026?

From the council’s waste services lookup, once you have entered your postcode and picked your address. The address page offers three routes: a printable PDF waste calendar, an “add to your calendar” subscription that feeds every date into your phone automatically and refreshes daily, and an “add to home screen” shortcut. There is no single borough-wide timetable, because collection day and which of the two alternating fortnights your street sits in both vary by address.

What colour bin is which in Sutton?

The brown wheelie bin is general rubbish, the green wheelie bin is paper and card, and the separate recycling box takes plastics, glass, cans and cartons. Food waste goes in the kitchen and outdoor caddies. Sutton’s brown bin is not garden waste, which catches out people moving from other boroughs.

Is Sutton bin collection weekly or fortnightly?

Food waste is collected every week. General rubbish, paper and card, and the plastics, glass, cans and cartons box are each collected every two weeks, with the two recycling streams falling on alternate weeks.

How much is garden waste collection in Sutton?

£99 a year per bin, which buys 24 fortnightly collections. The bin is supplied free with the subscription, and the service breaks for four weeks from 6 January to 31 January 2027.

Do Sutton bin collections change on a bank holiday?

On the evidence of the council’s own lookup, no. We checked 48 addresses across the borough on the August 2026 bank holiday and every one was still on its normal weekday, and none of them was a Monday round in the first place. Sutton appears to collect Tuesday to Friday, so a Monday bank holiday has nothing to shift. Christmas and New Year are different, because those dates land on ordinary weekdays, and the council publishes a separate festive calendar for them.

How much does a bulky waste collection cost in Sutton?

£49 for one to three items and £81.80 for four to six. Upholstered seating containing persistent organic pollutants costs £74 for one to three items and £122.70 for four to six. You can book up to six items at a time.

Do I have to pay for a replacement wheelie bin in Sutton?

Usually yes, since April 2026. A replacement general waste bin is £25, a replacement recycling wheelie bin £15, and a recycling box £5. Food caddies remain free, and you can claim a free replacement if the collection crew damaged or lost your bin, with photo or video evidence.

Sources

• London Borough of Sutton, waste services lookup, read for 48 addresses across the borough on 31 August 2026 for the round days, the bank holiday check and the PDF and calendar download options

• London Borough of Sutton, check your bin collection days

• London Borough of Sutton, your collection service: houses
• London Borough of Sutton, presenting your bins correctly on collection day
• London Borough of Sutton, sign up for garden waste collection
• London Borough of Sutton, waste container charges
• London Borough of Sutton, book a bulky item collection
• London Borough of Sutton, Kimpton Park Way recycling centre: find us and opening times
• London Borough of Sutton, report a missed collection
• London Borough of Sutton, small items recycling collection

Charges and dates are those published by the London Borough of Sutton and were checked in August 2026. Always confirm on the council’s own pages before you pay or put your bins out. Last updated August 2026.