Sevenoaks Bin Collection Days: Wheelie Bins Started 12 Oct

Sevenoaks district collected its last black sacks and green recycling bags on Friday 9 October 2026. Since Monday 12 October rubbish and recycling go into wheelie bins on alternate weeks, with glass collected at the kerb for the first time. Below: how to look up your wheelie bin dates, what goes in each bin, what to do if your bins have not come, what to do with bins that have already arrived, how to get rid of a wheelie bin of your own, whether you can refuse a bin, what Christmas does to collections and what to do if you are missed.

The quick answer

To find your day, enter your address in Sevenoaks District Council’s free waste collection checker, then put every container out by 7am. The last sacks went on Friday 9 October 2026, and since 12 October the district has been on wheelie bins: a 180-litre black bin for rubbish and a black bin with a green lid for all recycling, glass included for the first time, collected on alternate weeks, while the food waste caddy stays weekly. Your first recycling and rubbish dates are on the postcard the council has sent every household, and if you have lost it or it never came, the council’s first collection dates lookup gives them by address. On 21 October the council said the majority of households have their bins but some still do not; if you have ordered bins and they have not come by your collection day, put rubbish out in black sacks and recycling in cardboard boxes or clear sacks. If you do have the black bin, all your rubbish must fit inside it: bags left beside it are not collected. A bin you order now takes at least 10 working days to arrive. Garden waste is a separate paid subscription, and from the 12th it goes out the same week as your black bin.

How to find your bin collection day

Sevenoaks District Council runs a free online checker. You enter your address and it returns your rubbish, recycling, food waste and garden waste days.

• Go to the council’s find your waste collection day page. It has carried two lookups through the switch: the old one, which gives your day as it was before 12 October, and your first recycling and general waste dates from 12 October for the new bins.
• If you start from GOV.UK’s rubbish collection day finder, it simply matches your postcode to Sevenoaks District Council and sends you to the council’s own system.

Whatever day you are given, the rule is the same: containers out by 7am on collection day. Crews will not come back for bins put out late (Sevenoaks District Council collection rules).

What goes in which bin (since 12 October)

Most homes in the district are now on four containers (wheelie bin collections from October 2026):

• General rubbish: the 180-litre black wheelie bin, collected every other week.
• Recycling: the 240-litre bin with a green lid, collected in the opposite week. Paper, cardboard, cans, foil, plastic bottles, pots and tubs, cartons and now glass bottles and jars all go in together, loose.
• Food waste: a small grey kitchen caddy and a larger black and orange outdoor caddy, still collected every week.
• Garden waste: an optional paid service (see below), now collected in the same week as your black bin.

A small number of homes, flats above shops and properties without room or access for bins among them, stay on sacks, with recycling in clear sacks. The green reusable bags are no longer emptied, whatever is in them, garden waste included.

Food waste: what it is and what goes in

From Monday 27 April 2026, the council started separate weekly food waste collections for most households, with caddies delivered to around 50,000 homes from 30 March (council food waste announcement). It covers cooked and raw food: peelings, plate scrapings, bones, bread, teabags and the like. What it does not take is plastic bags or food packaging. Once collected, the food waste goes for anaerobic digestion to make renewable energy and fertiliser (food waste service).

Residents have taken to the new caddies quickly: in their first month the food waste rounds gathered 220 tonnes of scraps and lifted the district’s recycling rate to a record high, as we reported when Sevenoaks recycling hit a record high.

Flats, homes above shops, properties on communal bins and a small number of hard to serve addresses are not on the food waste service yet. The council says it plans to add communal recycling facilities for those residents in future years.

How to line your food caddy, and where to buy liners for 50p

This is the part that trips people up, and the council’s rule is strict: line the small indoor kitchen caddy with a compostable liner or a sheet of newspaper, and never a plastic bag, not even one labelled biodegradable. When you empty the indoor caddy into the black outdoor caddy with the orange lid, the liner goes in with it. Then lock the outdoor caddy by pushing the handle down, or the lid will not stay shut on a windy collection morning (food waste collections).

Compostable liners are on sale in most supermarkets, but you do not have to pay supermarket prices. Kent County Council is running a pilot that puts discounted caddy liners on sale at 50p a roll, limited to two rolls per person, at outlets across the district. The council describes the offer as available for a limited time, so it is worth using while it lasts. The same outlets sell garden waste sacks at £29 for a bundle of 25, or £1.16 for a single sack (where to buy liners and sacks).

Twenty-eight outlets stock them, spread across twenty towns and villages, and many are parish offices and village shops rather than big stores:

The council asks you to ring ahead before setting off, since stock and opening hours vary, and only its own offices are guaranteed to have them. If your household fills the outdoor caddy before collection day, you can ask the council for a second one, and new residents who arrived without caddies request them through the same replacement caddy form.

Garden waste: a paid subscription

Garden waste is the one collection here you have to pay for separately. Rubbish, recycling and the food caddy are covered by your council tax; garden waste sits outside it, on a subscription that is emptied fortnightly on the same weekday as the rest of your bins. Nothing is taken until you have joined and paid, and the permit runs from the date you applied rather than a fixed council year.

One dated exception applies this autumn: garden waste sack collections are suspended from 12 to 16 October for the wheelie bin changeover, while subscribed garden waste bins carry on as normal.

The prices, how to find your own fortnightly dates, the suspended week, what the bin will and will not take, the renewal anniversary that catches subscribers out and the £75 the council can charge for a bin you do not return are all on our full guide: Sevenoaks garden waste collection dates.

“Green bin” in Sevenoaks: which one people mean

Ask about the “green bin” in Sevenoaks and you could mean one of two things, so it is worth being clear:

• The green garden waste bin. This is the paid subscription bin above, collected fortnightly for garden cuttings only. In the council’s own container list it is a green bin with a blue lid. If you are searching for “green bin collection” and you mean garden waste, use the fortnightly dates from the council’s checker.
• The new green-lidded recycling bin. Since 12 October 2026 the district’s 240 litre recycling bin is black with a green lid and takes all your dry recycling, including glass for the first time. That is a different bin on a different, alternate-weekly schedule.

Lids are the quickest way to tell them apart: green lid means recycling, blue lid means garden waste, plain black means general rubbish, orange means the food caddy.

Both green bins are now in service, so check the lid before you wheel one out: the green-lidded recycling bin goes out in your recycling week, the blue-lidded garden bin in your black bin week.

The big change in 2026: wheelie bins from 12 October

This is the part worth reading even if you think you know your bin days. Sevenoaks moved from sacks to wheelie bins on Monday 12 October 2026, the same day right across the district.

Our report on the Sevenoaks wheelie bins recycling upgrade sets out the 12 October 2026 switch-over, the summer delivery window, and what happens to the old green recycling bags.

Between mid-July and mid-October 2026, most households received two wheelie bins (wheelie bin collections from October 2026):

• A 180 litre black bin for general rubbish.
• A 240 litre bin with a green lid for all your dry recycling.

The recycling bin now, for the first time, takes glass bottles and jars at the kerbside, alongside paper, cardboard, cans, foil, plastic bottles, pots and tubs and cartons. The council’s line is simple: “You can put all your dry recycling in one bin.”

What changes for you

Three things matter for your routine:

1. Collections are fortnightly for rubbish and recycling. Since 12 October, general waste and recycling are collected on alternate weeks, one week one, the next week the other. Food waste stays weekly, which is the council’s answer to the usual worry about smell with fortnightly rubbish (the BIG recycling upgrade).
2. The switch was district-wide, not household by household. Around 100,000 bins have been delivered since mid-July, and the changeover happened for everyone on Monday 12 October. Some households were still waiting after the switch, and the council said on 21 October that some properties still have not received theirs: if yours have not come, your collection still goes ahead, in sacks and boxes (wheelie bin collections from October 2026).
3. The green recycling bags stopped on 12 October, replaced by the green-lidded bin. Two rules come with that, and both cost you a collection if you miss them: anything presented in a reusable sack, recycling or garden waste, will not be collected, and the sack itself must not go in the recycling bin, because the recycling facility cannot take it in the household stream. There is no rush to get rid of the bag otherwise. You can reuse it, or keep it for the council’s separate collection of unwanted bags, expected in early 2027. Anything left loose beside a bin is side waste and will not be collected, with one exception covered below.

Households with extra need can apply for more capacity. The council’s collection standards name three grounds: five or more people in the household, medical needs that create extra waste, or very limited storage space, which is also the route to a smaller bin. It may ask for evidence or visit before agreeing. A webform for an additional bin opens now the service has started, and requests are judged case by case. Assisted collections continue for residents who cannot move a bin themselves, and a bin damaged by the crew is repaired or replaced, with new and replacement bins normally arriving within 10 working days.

Your bins: what the council asks

The council said on 1 October that most of the 45,000 households moving over had their bins (Sevenoaks District Council, 1 October 2026). Its instructions are easy to miss, and two of them can cost you a collection:

• Mark each bin with your house name or number, and keep both at your property. They belong to the address rather than to you.
• Put them out by 7am and leave them out until 4pm or until they have been emptied, at the edge of your property by the road or at your agreed collection point, lids closed and nothing overflowing. Rubbish, recycling and food waste come on different lorries at different times of day, and the times can change from week to week.
• If your neighbours have their bins and you do not, wait 24 hours before reporting it. Crews often take more than one day over a street. The council’s wheelie bin page, reread on 21 October, no longer gives an estate-by-estate delivery update: it says the majority of households have their bins and apologises to those still waiting. Once the council accepts a request for bins, delivery takes at least 10 working days, so order early rather than waiting for a second missed week. Both estates have their own maps of where to leave bins: New Ash Green collection points, one for each part of the village, and Spitals Cross collection points. The same online form covers a bin that arrives damaged or faulty.
• No bins by your first collection? Use sacks and boxes. The council’s instruction is to put general waste out in household waste sacks and recycling in cardboard boxes or clear sacks, not in the green reusable bag, which is no longer emptied (wheelie bin collections from October 2026).

Storage is the other question the council is getting, and its answer is firm: having limited space, a few steps, decorative landscaping or simply a preference not to have bins on show “will not normally prevent a property from being required to use wheeled bins”, and households may need to make “reasonable and proportionate” adjustments to their outdoor space. A small number of properties are exempt, flats above shops and homes with no suitable storage or access among them; those homes stay on sack collections.

Which week is your recycling week: your postcard, or the new lookup

This is now answered. The council has posted every household on the new service a postcard with its first recycling and first general waste collection dates, and its wheelie bin page says “You should have received a postcard by now.” If yours never arrived or has gone in the recycling, use the council’s first recycling and general waste collection dates lookup: enter your address and it gives the same two dates. Count forward a fortnight from each and you have every date after that (wheelie bin collections from October 2026, Sevenoaks District Council, 1 October 2026).

Two things catch people out. If you land on the old checker, it shows your day before 12 October, which is now the wrong answer, so make sure you are on the lookup headed “from 12 October”. And the postcard settles your fortnight, which is the part that changes; the council has said most households keep the same weekday.

Garden waste moves with it. To make the new rounds work, the council is aligning general waste and garden waste collection weeks, so from 12 October the garden bin goes out on the same day and in the same week as your black bin, and “some customers will have a new collection week” (changes to garden waste collection weeks). A new week is a harder change than a new weekday: it moves you to the opposite fortnight, so the gap around 12 October is either one week or three rather than the usual two. From now on, your garden bin goes out whenever your black bin does. Garden waste sacks are not collected at all from 12 to 16 October. More on what the switch does to garden waste.

On the day itself, bins go out by 7am and stay out until 4pm or until they are emptied, at the edge of your property with the lids closed. Rubbish, recycling and food waste come on different lorries at different times of day, and the council warns those times can change from week to week, so a bin still full at lunchtime is not yet a missed collection.

What goes in each new bin, and the glass that does not

The council has now published the full contents list for both bins:

• Green-lidded recycling bin, 240 litres: glass bottles and jars; paper and card; cardboard boxes and packaging; metal tins, including empty aerosols, cans, bottle tops, lids and foil; plastic bottles, tops, pots, tubs and trays; food and drink cartons, including Tetra Paks.
• Black general waste bin, 180 litres: nappies and sanitary products; tissues and wet wipes; pet waste and cat litter; plastic bags, wrapping and clear film; polystyrene, bubble wrap and foam packaging; crockery, ceramics and other types of glass; dust, vacuum contents and sweepings; toothbrushes, plastic toys and non-recyclable plastics; fireplace, stove and barbecue ashes, cold and bagged.

The glass line is the one to read twice. Kerbside glass means bottles and jars only. Drinking glasses, Pyrex, window glass, perfume bottles, crockery and ceramics all belong in the black bin, and the wrong sort of glass in the recycling bin is exactly the contamination that gets a bin left behind. Food waste, garden waste and anything recyclable should not go in the black bin either.

Two further rules arrive with the bins. If it is not in the bin, it will not be collected, so extra sacks and side waste are out, with one exception: flattened cardboard left neatly next to a full recycling bin will be taken. And because rubbish, recycling and food waste travel on different lorries, at times that can change from week to week, the council asks you to leave your bins out until 4pm rather than assume an empty kerb at eleven in the morning means you were missed.

Already have your own wheelie bin? How to get rid of it

A bin you bought yourself stopped being any use on 12 October, because crews will only empty council-issued bins. The council’s wheelie bin page, reread on 9 October, now gives two ways to dispose of one (wheelie bin collections from October 2026):

• Book the district council’s paid large item collection, £26 for a single item, collected on your normal collection day.
• Use a registered waste company, and check its registration first, because you stay responsible for where your waste ends up.

Until early October the same page also said you could take the bin to a Kent County Council recycling centre free of charge. That line has been removed, and Kent’s own A-Z of what its tips accept has no wheelie bin entry, so check with Kent before booking a slot at the Dunbrik or Swanley tip just for the bin. Leaving an old bin at the kerb beside the new ones does not work: from the 12th anything outside a council bin is side waste and is not collected.

The roadshows have finished

The waste team’s three walk-up sessions ran in Edenbridge on 19 September, Swanley Market on 23 September and at the Blighs clock tower in Sevenoaks on 26 September. The council has since taken its roadshow page down and has announced no more dates. If you still have a question before the switch, the council’s new bins and collections FAQs answer most of what was being asked in person, and a missing or damaged bin goes through the report a problem with your wheelie bins form.

Can you refuse a wheelie bin? No, and the council is using the law to say so

This is the question the council is fielding most often, and its answer is blunter than most residents expect. Buried in a FAQ set that sits behind an iframe on the council’s own site, rather than on the main wheelie bin page, is this:

No. Where a property can accommodate and present wheelie bins, we require waste and recycling to be presented in the Council-issued bins. We are writing to households with a notice under Section 46 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. This allows us to specify the bins that must be used for household waste and recycling collections.

Section 46 is the power a council uses to tell a household which container to use and where to put it. Once that notice has been served, waste presented any other way “may not be collected”. So the letter arriving with your bins is not a leaflet.

Three follow-ups the council has now answered in the same place:

• Conservation areas are not exempt. The council’s position is that conservation status “relates to planning controls over buildings and development” and does not change how collections operate. A physically suitable property in a conservation area uses wheelie bins like anywhere else.
• Your own wheelie bin will not be emptied. Since 12 October only council-issued bins are collected, “even if they are newer, larger or appear similar to our bins”. The council cites capacity, contamination, safety, collection records and who is liable for damage.
• Storage is not, on its own, a way out. The council assessed properties from records, local knowledge and operational checks rather than household by household, and expects most homes to find room in a front garden, side passage, rear access, garage or outbuilding. It will review “clear cases” of a genuine storage, access, presentation or safety problem, but states plainly that “preference, appearance, low waste use, parking convenience or not wanting bins are not grounds for exemption”.

If your property is judged unsuitable, you go to fortnightly sacks

An exemption is not a return to the service you have now. The council says most exempt houses move to alternate weekly sack collections, recycling one week and general waste the next, with food waste still weekly. Only severely constrained properties, flats above shops among them, are likely to stay on weekly sacks. Either way the reusable green recycling sack finished on 12 October and must not be used.

If you already share communal bins, your frequency does not change. Some flats and managed sites currently on sacks are moving to communal bins or individual containers, and that is a matter for the landlord or managing agent, who is responsible for storage and access. Assisted collections are not normally provided where communal facilities are used.

Private roads, long drives and rear access

The other change that catches people is where the lorry will stop. Collections from private roads are “not automatic”, and the council has said in terms that historic arrangements do not automatically continue when the service changes. Well laid, well maintained private roads may be served as before. Crews will not routinely enter private drives and tracks, unadopted roads, rear access routes, or anywhere that reversing, road surface, turning space, gradients, locked gates, overhanging vegetation, parked cars or a long carry make the job unsafe. In those cases residents are asked to present bins at the roadside or another agreed point.

The council’s collection standards put the same rule more simply: crews will not normally go more than a few metres beyond your boundary unless you have been approved for an assisted collection. If your sacks have always been taken from the top of a long drive, that is worth settling with the council now rather than after a missed collection, because a bin left in the wrong place is not treated as a missed collection.

Bank holiday bin days: the next change is Christmas

The August bank holiday is done. Collections went back to their normal days from Monday 7 September, and there is no further bank holiday in England until Christmas, so nothing moves between now and then.

The three dates that will move something are Friday 25 December, Monday 28 December (the substitute day for Boxing Day) and Friday 1 January 2027. Sevenoaks has used the same rule for years on a single bank holiday: nothing is collected on the day itself, and every round for the rest of that week runs one day later, which is exactly what it did in August, finishing on the Saturday.

Christmas is the one time that rule is not enough on its own. The break covers three bank holidays inside eight working days rather than one, and this year it also falls under a service that will be barely ten weeks old, with rubbish and recycling on alternate weeks for the first time. The council has not published its festive arrangements yet. When it does, they appear as a notice on its find your waste collection day page, which is the same place the short-notice changes go: it carried the August notice, and before that the heatwave notice moving July’s collections to a 6am start. We will put the dates here as soon as they are out. Our Sevenoaks Christmas bin collections page sets out last year’s pattern in full, so you can see the shape of the slip before this year’s dates land.

Two things you can plan around already. Subscription garden waste stops for roughly four weeks over Christmas and New Year, because the permit buys 48 weeks of collections rather than 52. And the tip does not close: Kent County Council keeps the Dunbrik and Swanley sites open on bank holidays, on the shorter Sunday hours of 9am to 4pm, and you still need a booking (tip opening times).

That page is worth watching rather than trusting at a glance. It ran the August bank holiday notice for more than a fortnight after that week had ended; the notice has now been cleared, and on 22 September the page carried nothing but the address lookup. An empty page there means no short-notice change, not that the festive dates are out.

If your bin is missed

Crews will not empty a bin or sack that is contaminated with the wrong materials, overflowing, too heavy, blocked, or left out with loose side waste. Nor will they take anything put out late or in the wrong place: everything should be at the edge of your property nearest the road by 7am, and not put out before 6pm the night before (collection rules). If none of that applies and your collection was genuinely missed, report it through the council’s report a missed collection page.

Food waste is the exception worth knowing. It travels on a different lorry from your rubbish and recycling, so it is often picked up hours apart from everything else. An empty kerb by mid-morning does not mean you have been missed. The council asks you to wait until 4pm on your collection day before reporting food waste as missed, and if you do report it, leave the caddy out until it is emptied.

Frequently asked questions

How do I find my bin collection day in Sevenoaks?

Use the council’s find your waste collection day tool and enter your address. It returns your rubbish, recycling, food waste and garden waste days. Put everything out by 7am.

When did the new wheelie bins start in Sevenoaks?

On Monday 12 October 2026, the same day right across the district. The council said on 21 October that the majority of households have their bins but some still do not. Anyone who has ordered bins and is still waiting puts rubbish out in black sacks and recycling in cardboard boxes or clear sacks on their usual alternate weekly day.

What if my Sevenoaks wheelie bins have not arrived?

Wait 24 hours after your neighbours’ bins appear, then use the council’s report a problem with your wheelie bins form. If they still have not come by your first collection, put rubbish out in household waste sacks and recycling in cardboard boxes or clear sacks. Do not use the green reusable bag; it is no longer emptied.

Which week is my recycling week in Sevenoaks?

It is on the postcard the council has sent every household on the new service, which gives your first recycling and first general waste collection dates from 12 October; each then repeats every two weeks. If you do not have the postcard, the council’s first collection dates lookup gives the same dates by address. Garden waste subscribers go out in the same week as their general waste from 12 October, which moves some of them to a different week.

When do I take the seals off my new Sevenoaks wheelie bin?

Now. The council’s rule was to take them off one week before your first wheelie bin collection, and the new service started on 12 October 2026, so every bin should be unsealed and in use. Keep the bins at your property, marked with your house name or number if you wish.

Can I put drinking glasses in the new Sevenoaks recycling bin?

No. The green-lidded bin takes glass bottles and jars only. Drinking glasses, Pyrex, window glass, perfume bottles, crockery and ceramics all go in the black general waste bin.

When is the green bin collected in Sevenoaks?

It depends which green bin you mean. The green garden waste bin is a paid subscription collected fortnightly, on the same weekday as your other bins, so check your dates in the council’s find your waste collection day tool, or read our garden waste page. Since 12 October 2026 there is also a recycling bin with a green lid for all your dry recycling, including glass, collected on alternate weeks.

Are bin collections weekly or fortnightly in Sevenoaks?

Fortnightly for rubbish and recycling, which have been collected on alternate weeks since 12 October 2026. Food waste is still collected every week.

Does Sevenoaks collect glass at the kerbside?

Yes, since 12 October 2026. Glass bottles and jars go loose in the green-lidded recycling bin with the rest of your dry recycling.

Is garden waste collected with my other Sevenoaks bins?

No. Rubbish, recycling and the weekly food caddy come with your council tax; garden waste is a separate paid subscription, emptied fortnightly on the same weekday. The prices, the permit rules, the 12 to 16 October sack suspension, the missed-collection deadline and how to work out your own dates are on our garden waste collection dates page.

What can I use to line my food waste caddy in Sevenoaks?

A compostable liner or a sheet of newspaper. Plastic bags are not accepted, including bags sold as biodegradable. Compostable liners are stocked by most supermarkets, and Kent County Council is running a pilot that sells caddy liners at 50p a roll, two rolls per person, from 28 outlets across the district.

When was the last sack collection in Sevenoaks?

The week ending Friday 9 October 2026. Wheelie bins on alternate weeks took over from 12 October, and anything put out in a reusable green sack since then is not collected. Homes exempt from wheelie bins stay on sacks.

Can I refuse a wheelie bin in Sevenoaks?

No, not if your property can store and present one. The council is serving households with a notice under Section 46 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990, which lets it specify the containers that must be used, and it says waste presented any other way may not be collected. Preference, appearance, low waste, parking or a conservation area are not grounds for exemption; a genuine storage, access or safety problem is, and the council will review clear cases.

Can I use my own wheelie bin for Sevenoaks collections?

No. Since 12 October 2026 only council-issued bins are emptied, even if a private bin is newer, larger or looks similar. If you have a bin you no longer want, the council now points you to its paid large item collection (£26 for one item) or a registered waste company; its earlier line about free disposal at a Kent tip has been removed.

Can I put my green recycling bag in the new recycling bin?

No. The recycling facility cannot take the reusable sacks in the household stream, so keep the bag out of the bin. Reuse it, hold it for the council’s separate collection of unwanted bags expected in early 2027, or dispose of it yourself.

Do bin days change on bank holidays in Sevenoaks?

Yes. Nothing is collected on the bank holiday itself and every round for the rest of that week runs a day later, which is what happened in August 2026. The next bank holidays are Friday 25 December, Monday 28 December and Friday 1 January 2027. Christmas and New Year is longer than a single day and is announced separately; the council has not published those dates yet.

Sources

• Sevenoaks District Council, find your waste collection day
• Sevenoaks District Council, our waste and recycling collection rules
• Sevenoaks District Council, wheelie bin collections from October 2026
• Sevenoaks District Council, frequently asked questions: new bins and collections from autumn 2026 (the Section 46 notices, conservation areas, private bins, exempt properties, private roads, garden waste week, extra capacity, the green sack rules)
• Sevenoaks District Council, changes to garden waste collection weeks (the September letter to every household about its alternate weekly cycle, the alignment of general waste and garden waste weeks, and the late-September email to permit holders)
• Sevenoaks District Council, the BIG recycling upgrade
• Sevenoaks District Council, book a large item collection
• Sevenoaks District Council, council gears up for new weekly food waste collections
• Sevenoaks District Council, food waste collections
• Sevenoaks District Council, where to buy food waste bin liners and garden waste sacks
• Sevenoaks District Council, garden waste collection and what goes in your garden waste
• Sevenoaks District Council, Countdown begins to new wheelie bin collections, including glass recycling!, 1 October 2026 (45,000 households, deliveries originally to 11 October, postcards with first dates, garden waste on the general waste day)
• Sevenoaks District Council, first recycling and general waste collection dates from 12 October (address lookup)
• Sevenoaks District Council, bank holiday waste collections
• Sevenoaks District Council, report a missed collection
• GOV.UK rubbish collection day finder for Sevenoaks
• Kent County Council, Sevenoaks Household Waste Recycling Centre

Last updated 21 October 2026: the council’s wheelie bin page, reread today, has dropped its New Ash Green and Spitals Cross delivery notes and now says the majority of households have their bins, that the sacks-and-boxes fallback is for people who have ordered bins and not received them, and that waste left outside a council black bin will not be collected; the quick answer, the bins section and the FAQ were brought into line. Previously updated 15 October 2026: the council’s wheelie bin page, reread today, says deliveries are still going on, New Ash Green’s are ongoing and Spitals Cross should be finished before its next collection, and that a bin ordered now takes at least 10 working days; the 13 and 14 October delivery dates were replaced in the quick answer, the bins section and the FAQ. Previously updated 12 October 2026: the page moved onto the live service now that wheelie bins have replaced sacks, and the council’s wheelie bin page, reread today, says New Ash Green’s deliveries will not be finished before its first collection on Tuesday 13 October (we had said by the 12th); its collection-point maps for New Ash Green and Spitals Cross, its 7am to 4pm presentation rule and its line that green bags are not emptied even for garden waste were added. Previously updated 9 October 2026: the council’s wheelie bin page, reread today, now says deliveries carry on over the weekend of 10 and 11 October and into the following week (New Ash Green by 12 October, the Spitals Cross estate in Edenbridge by 14 October), so every “deliveries finish on 11 October” line was corrected, and its instruction for homes still without bins at their first collection (household sacks for rubbish, cardboard boxes or clear sacks for recycling) was added to the quick answer, the bins section and a new FAQ. Previously updated 4 October 2026: the council’s postcards and its new first collection dates lookup now answer which week is yours, so that section and its FAQ were rewritten from the wheelie bin page, the find your collection day page and the council’s 1 October announcement, all reread today; deliveries now run to Sunday 11 October, the seal rule counts back from your own first date, and the 7am to 4pm presentation rule and varying lorry times were added. Previously updated 29 September 2026: the finished September roadshows closed off (the council has removed its roadshow page) and a section added on disposing of a wheelie bin you own, from the council’s wheelie bin page rechecked today, which still says alternate weekly dates will be confirmed nearer the time. Previously updated 22 September 2026: the alternate weekly section rebuilt on the council’s own changes to garden waste collection weeks notice, which is where it commits to writing to every household during September about its collection cycle, and which is the only council page saying that aligning general waste and garden waste weeks moves some garden waste customers to a different week. The roadshow table cut to the two sessions still to come, and the council’s collection day page rechecked: the August bank holiday notice has been cleared. Updated 16 September 2026: the opening rewritten around the sack end date and the 12 October switch, and the free caddy liner roll at the roadshows added from the council’s roadshow page. Updated 7 September 2026: the council publishes a set of FAQs on the changeover as an embedded panel rather than as a page, so its answers do not show up in a normal read of the site. Added from it on that date: the Section 46 notices being served on households, the position on conservation areas and privately owned bins, what an exempt property actually gets (alternate weekly sacks, or weekly sacks where the constraint is severe), the rules on private roads and long drives, the two green sack rules, and the council’s confirmation that most collection days are not changing, that it will write to households whose day does move, and that garden waste subscribers fall in the same week as their general waste. The last sack collection date, the bin colours and lids, and the grounds for a bigger or extra bin come from the council’s collection standards, rechecked the same day. The expired August bank holiday section was replaced with the Christmas position; the three bank holiday dates are from the GOV.UK bank holidays list. The council’s own collection day page was still carrying the August notice when we checked. Figures are from Sevenoaks District Council; the service is mid-change in 2026, so check the council’s own pages for the latest before putting your bins out.

Image: “Wheelie bins on parade in Pepper Lane” by Ian Greig, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wheelie_bins_on_parade_in_Pepper_Lane_-geograph.org.uk-_2724999.jpg).