Wiz
You are correct in that the worst part of the job is that you can not clean the bin until it is empty.
Most local councils state that bins should be out by 7:30 in the morning and if not emptied by 7:00 at night should be taken in and put out again the next day.
In my experience the council get a days work done on the correct day about 19 days out of 20 their is always the day when they have a break down etc which they finish the next morning. When you are 1 van 1 man and building a round and this happens its not to bad but when you have a full round to do it is hard. As your business grows and you get more vans and drivers it gets easier again.
You do not reschedule this is impossible and you have to explain this to the customers when it happens.
For example we operate two weekly lets say we do not get Tuesday done this week on one of the rounds we cant do it next week because we are somewhere else so the customers have to wait until we return on normal day. If this happens a lot to the same customers you end up adjusting their direct debit.
Most councils operate on the same day and the same route through the round we tend to market our rounds from the start of the day on wards so that the later in the day it gets the less of an impact a breakdown will have.
The most difficult is when you are trying to build rounds and have an area where perhaps 3 or 4 vans are operating and you are ruining around behind them all.
As a one man band is is easier to start late and work late as you never have to wait but as you grow this is not practical
Don't let this put you off it is a small negative in what other wise is a good business to be in.
For example very little customer contact, very little complaints, easy to train staff, good cash flow, large customer base so loss of one customer has no real impact, Monday to Friday business, no overtime, no call outs, high repeat business 52 weeks a year, not weather Dependant. etc etc.
Hope this helps
Cheers
George
