Waste removal in London: bulky waste fees, skip licences and local firms

Quick answer: London has 32 borough councils plus the City of London, and each sets its own bulky waste fees and skip licence charges. Of the borough pages we read in September 2026, a bulky collection ran from free (Tower Hamlets and Wandsworth give households two a year) to £116 for 10 items (Lambeth), and a skip licence from £33 for a week (Tower Hamlets) to £91 a month (Westminster), before any parking suspension.

How waste removal works in London

There is no London-wide bulky waste service or skip licence. Your borough decides what it collects, how many items count as one booking and what it charges, and it also licenses skips on its own roads. Two neighbouring boroughs can charge very different amounts for the same sofa or the same skip, so the answer depends on your postcode. GOV.UK’s “Find your local council” tool tells you which borough covers your address.

Council bulky waste collections: a sample of 6 boroughs

We read each borough’s own page in September 2026. The other 26 boroughs and the City of London may charge quite differently, so treat this as a sample rather than a London price list.

Borough	Price	Free allowance or concession	Notes
Camden	£25 for 1 to 5 items; £50 for 6 to 10; £75 for 11 to 15 (or 20, 40 or 60 black bags)	Some residents may qualify for 2 free collections a year	Large electricals £10 for up to 2; AnyJunk and the North London Waste Authority offer a free collection of up to 4 large electrical items
Croydon	£40.40 for 1 to 3 items; £65.30 for 4 to 6	Not stated on the page we read	Collection runs all year
Lambeth	£36 for up to 3 items; £70 for up to 6; £116 for up to 10	Free reuse collection with the charity Emmaus for items in good condition	Maximum 10 items per order; no refund once paid
Tower Hamlets	Free	2 free collections a year, up to 5 items each	Your own household waste only; you must live at the property
Wandsworth	£24.90 for up to 4 items, plus £11.10 per extra item	2 free collections a year (up to 4 items or 12 sacks)	Three sacks count as one item; landlords pay £106.70 for 1 to 4 items
Westminster	£36 for up to 6 items, plus £6.40 per extra item	Free for residents on Housing Benefit or Council Tax Support: one collection of up to 6 items every 90 days	Aims to collect within three working days

Paid collections for a handful of items cluster between about £25 and £40. The free allowances in Tower Hamlets and Wandsworth, and the concession in Westminster, are worth using before you pay anyone. Our guide to council bulky waste collections covers the common restrictions.

Skip licences in London

You need a licence from the borough to put a skip on a public road; you do not need one for a skip on your own driveway or land. In the boroughs we checked, only the skip company can apply, so the licence (and any parking suspension) normally appears on your skip quote. Camden does not allow skips on the pavement.

Borough	Skip licence fee (2026/27)	Parking bays
Camden	£71.50 for two weeks; £103.68 for four weeks	A parking suspension is also needed if the skip takes up any of a bay: £66.66 admin fee plus £54.68 to £103.90 per space per day, depending on length
Lambeth	£80 per licence (the same on an unmarked road, a single yellow line, a suspended bay or a traffic-sensitive road)	Suspension arranged separately
Tower Hamlets	£33 for 1 to 7 days; £71 for 8 to 14 days; £79 for 15 to 28 days	£63 per occupied parking space per day
Wandsworth	£37.60 for 5 or 14 days; £72.20 for 28 days	Parking bay suspension charged separately
Westminster	£91 a month, covering up to two skips	A parking suspension or yellow line dispensation is also needed; one skip per suspension

In Camden and Tower Hamlets the parking charge can easily cost more than the licence itself, which is one reason London skip quotes run higher than elsewhere. Rules on lighting, marking and moving a skip are set out in our guide to skips on the road after the permit.

Recycling centres and fly-tipping

Most boroughs run or share a reuse and recycling centre. Southwark’s centre is free for Southwark residents, and Wandsworth residents can take bulky items to Smugglers Way or a Mega Skip day free of charge. In England, councils can now issue a fixed penalty of up to £1,000 for fly-tipping, and up to £600 to a householder who hands waste to someone who then dumps it (GOV.UK, from July 2023). That second fine is why checking a carrier matters. See fly-tipping and the law.

Private waste removal costs in London

For typical private prices, use the national ranges in our UK waste removal costs guide. Checkatrade’s June 2026 skip guide puts a 2 to 3 yard mini skip at £75 to £175 a week, a 4 to 5 yard midi at £130 to £320 and a 6 to 8 yard builder’s skip at £190 to £450, and its rubbish removal guide gives £64 to £94 an hour for a man and van. Checkatrade gives London its own column: £135 to £175 for a mini skip, £220 to £350 for a 4 to 5 yard skip and £330 to £450 for an 8 yard skip, before any licence or parking suspension. The council’s own fee is a useful benchmark when you compare quotes for a few bulky items.

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We are a comparison and referral service, not a waste removal company. We do not guarantee a quote, a price or a response time. In the UK, always check the carrier's waste carrier registration before handing over waste.

How to choose a waste carrier

Anyone you pay to take your rubbish away must be registered to carry waste. In England that is the Environment Agency register, which GOV.UK lets you search by name, postcode or registration number. If your waste is later fly-tipped by someone you did not check, you can be fined too. Before you book:

Check the register yourself. Ask for the registration number and look it up, rather than relying on a logo on a van or website.
Ask where the waste goes. A proper firm will name the transfer station or recycling site it uses.
Get a waste transfer note or receipt that describes the waste and names the carrier.
Ask what the price covers: labour, loading time, weight or volume limits, and extra charges for fridges, mattresses, sofas or plasterboard.
For a skip on the road, ask the firm to confirm it is applying for the council permit and whether the price includes it.

More on this in how to check a waste carrier and your waste duty of care.

Waste removal businesses in London

These firms appear in public business listings for London. We have not checked their work, prices, licences or insurance, and they have not paid to appear. Check each one on the waste carrier register before you book.