UK waste law

Who has to do what under UK waste law, and where does digital waste tracking fit?

Last checked 5 October 2026

Most of the questions we are asked come down to one thing: which rule binds me, from when, and what do I have to keep. The answer depends on where you sit in the chain. Below are eight situations. For each one we say what the law says, with the instrument it comes from and the date we read it, what you must do, and where DutyOS fits. Where DutyOS does not fit, we say that too.

1. You run a permitted site in England that receives waste

What the law says

• Digital waste tracking has been mandatory for you since 1 October 2026. The Digital Waste Tracking (England) Regulations 2026, SI 2026/729, made 24 June 2026, bind the operator of a permitted facility that receives controlled waste. We read the made text on 14 August and again on 16 September 2026.
• Each load must be recorded by the end of the second working day after you receive it (regulation 4(8)). An error must be corrected within one month of you becoming aware of it (regulation 7). The fixed penalty is £1,000 (Schedule 2).
• DEFRA charges £26 a year per organisation for the service (GOV.UK, Report receipt of waste, updated 25 September 2026).
• Your other paperwork continues. The Environment Agency said on 30 April 2026 that operators must also continue to complete hazardous waste consignee returns, quarterly waste returns, consignment notes and waste transfer notes as normal. Digital tracking sits alongside them; it does not replace them. Our answer on that explains why.
• A household waste recycling centre in England: deposits by residents of household waste are out of scope, but commercial intake at the same site is in (regulation 4(2)).

What you must do

• Record every load within two working days, with the waste code, the quantity and the carrier’s details.
• Correct mistakes within a month of finding them.
• Keep filing your quarterly consignee return if you take hazardous waste, and keep your transfer notes and consignment notes as before.

Where DutyOS fits

DutyOS is on GOV.UK’s list of software providers for the Report receipt of waste service, listed on 8 September 2026, and passed all 14 of DEFRA’s production approval tests with no exemptions. Each receipt is sent to DEFRA from your own account and shows its two working day countdown. Your quarterly consignee return is built from the receipts you have already recorded, so the same load is not typed twice. If your answers about your site say it has no phase 1 duty, the server refuses a first send rather than filing something you did not owe. Memberships for receiving sites start at £19.99 + VAT a month for one permitted site (Solo); Site, Team and Site Pro cover 3, 5 and any number of sites at £29.99, £59.99 and £99.99. The receiving sites page has the detail.

2. You run a permitted site in Wales

What the law says

• Same date, 1 October 2026, under Wales’s own instrument: The Digital Waste Tracking (Wales) Regulations 2026, WSI 2026/105, made 26 March 2026. We read it beside the English text on legislation.gov.uk on 18 September 2026.
• The numbers are identical: the second working day, one month to correct, a £1,000 fixed penalty, £26 a year.
• The regulator is Natural Resources Wales (regulation 9). A digitally excluded operator holds a “digitally excluded operator number” issued by NRW.
• A Welsh household waste recycling centre run under section 51 is out of scope entirely, including other controlled waste brought by other persons (regulation 4(2)). The Welsh Government page says plainly that HWRCs are not in scope in Wales.

What you must do

• The same two working days, one month and record keeping as in England.
• Your consignee return goes to NRW, not the Environment Agency.

Where DutyOS fits

The duty profile in DutyOS asks which nation your site is in and applies the Welsh carve out. A Welsh local authority site’s first send is refused because it has no duty; an English one with commercial intake is not. The returns module asks which regulator receives the return rather than guessing from a postcode.

3. You run a permitted site in Scotland

What the law says

• Mandatory from 1 January 2027 under The Digital Waste Tracking (Scotland) Regulations 2026, SSI 2026/145, made 11 March 2026.
• The second working day and the one month to correct are the same as in England and Wales.
• There is no fixed penalty in the Scottish instrument. Enforcement runs through compliance notices and criminal offences (regulation 17). Anyone who tells you £1,000 applies in Scotland has not read it.

What you must do

• Be ready to record every load from 1 January 2027.
• Keep your SEPA paperwork, including special waste consignment notes, as before.

Where DutyOS fits

DEFRA runs one service for the whole UK and DutyOS speaks to that one service, so a receipt from a Scottish site travels the same route as an English one; only the start date differs. We have not yet put the Scottish duty of care paperwork through a live test and we do not claim it until we have.

4. You run a permitted site in Northern Ireland

What the law says

• GOV.UK gives January 2027 as the target date for Northern Ireland, and a target is what it is. We searched legislation.gov.uk for a made Statutory Rule on 14 August and again on 16 September 2026, using the English, Welsh and Scottish instruments as controls, and found none. DAERA’s own page still describes the system as under development.
• The power to make the rule has existed since 28 February 2022 (article 5G of the Waste and Contaminated Land (Northern Ireland) Order 1997), so the position can change quickly. A rule laid in draft before the Assembly is the first thing to watch for.

What you must do

• Treat January 2027 as the plan, not yet the law. Check again before the end of 2026.
• Your NIEA consignment note numbers and duty of care records carry on unchanged.

Where DutyOS fits

The same single UK service applies. Our Duty Watch page lists regulator publications as they appear, so a Northern Ireland rule being laid would show there. We say “target” on every screen that mentions Northern Ireland, and will keep doing so until an instrument is made.

5. You are a waste carrier, broker or dealer

What the law says

• You have no digital waste tracking duty today. DEFRA has stated an intention of October 2027 for carriers on a GOV.UK guidance page. No instrument anywhere in the UK extends the duty to you yet. It is a plan, not law, and we write it that way everywhere.
• Your duty of care continues in full: section 34 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. In England and Wales the transfer note contents are set by regulation 35 of the Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2011, and the note is kept for two years. Scotland (SSI 2014/4, regulation 3) and Northern Ireland (SR 2002/271, regulation 2) have their own rules; the six digit waste codes are the same across the UK.
• In England your registration is being replaced by an environmental permit. SI 2026/873, made 22 July 2026, repeals the carrier, broker and dealer registration regime from 22 July 2027 and brings waste controlling and waste transporting inside environmental permitting. We read the made text in full on 25 August 2026; our post on it walks through the timetable.
• The date is per carrier, not one date for everyone (regulation 28). Most commercial carriers must hold a permit from the day after their registration was due to expire, so the date is on your certificate. Lower tier bodies have until 22 July 2028. Those not required to register today need a permit or registered exemption on 22 July 2027. Applying at least three months before your date keeps the old registration alive until the decision (regulation 30).
• Already in force since 12 August 2026: an England connected carrier, broker or dealer must not hold more than one registration; only the earliest is valid and later ones are void (regulation 29).
• From 1 October 2026 every permitted site you deliver to in England or Wales files a digital record about your load: the waste, the quantities and your registration details. If your paperwork is wrong, that record is wrong, in a regulator’s database, with your name on it.

What you must do

• Keep a transfer note for every load, with the right code, kept two years.
• Find your registration expiry date. In England that is your permit date; apply early.
• Check you hold exactly one registration.
• Give receiving sites accurate details, because they are now filing them.

Where DutyOS fits

DutyOS files the transfer note with every statutory field in one form, takes the signature on screen with the signatory’s printed name, records why when no signature could be collected, and locks the signature evidence once the note is filed: the database refuses the edit, whoever asks. The waste code is chosen from all 842 codes in DEFRA’s catalogue, reconciled against DEFRA’s live service with no differences. Each note is a PDF that carries your registration number. Your customers and your invoicing live in the same system. Operator is £39 + VAT a month for up to 2 sites; Crew £89 for up to 10; Group £179 for any number. DutyOS Ltd is itself a registered upper tier carrier, CBDU652456, so the permit change is our problem as well as yours. The waste carriers page has the detail.

6. You produce, carry or receive hazardous waste

What the law says

• Hazardous waste moves on a consignment note with Parts A to E. England runs on the Hazardous Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2005, SI 2005/894; Wales runs on its own instrument, WSI 2005/1806, because regulation 1(3) of the English one carves Wales out. Read on legislation.gov.uk on 13 September 2026. Notes are kept for three years.
• A consignee who finds an error on the note at delivery must not correct it and must not ask for it to be corrected. They must reject the waste and record the rejection in Part E (Environment Agency guidance, read 13 September 2026). Parts A to D cannot be changed once the consignor has signed them off; a change makes the note invalid.
• The Part E quantity is determined by the consignee in kilograms, by weighing or a reliable conversion, not copied from Part B. The quarterly consignee return form has a kilograms field only (GOV.UK supplementary guidance, updated 19 February 2026).
• The quarterly consignee return under regulation 53, and the copy to the producer under regulation 54, continue alongside digital waste tracking.

What you must do

• Producer: complete Parts A and B correctly before the waste moves.
• Carrier: carry the note, complete Part C, and do not alter A to D.
• Consignee: weigh in kilograms, complete Part E, reject anything with an error on its note, and file the quarterly return.

Where DutyOS fits

Consignment notes are filed in DutyOS from the same place as transfer notes. The receiving site completes and signs its part through a single use, expiring share link, without needing an account. A received note keeps Parts A to D frozen, which is what the guidance requires. Litres are never converted to kilograms by guesswork; the operator records the weighed figure.

7. You run a skip hire firm

What the law says

• A skip entirely on private land needs no permit. A skip on a public road needs the highway authority’s permission before delivery, from the local council, found by postcode (GOV.UK, Skip licence, updated 23 April 2026; Highways Act 1980, section 139). A skip cannot go on the pavement.
• Permit cost, duration and processing time are set by each council. GOV.UK states none of them, so neither do we.
• On a hire of one month or more, the hirer becomes the “owner” for the purposes of section 139 (subsection 11), with the duties on lighting, marking and removal.
• Asbestos, tyres, batteries, paint and solvents, gas cylinders, fridges and clinical waste never go in a standard skip.
• A skip firm is a carrier. Everything in situation 5 applies to you, including the move to permits in England.

What you must do

• Get the council’s permission before a skip touches a public road.
• Keep a transfer note for every skip, with the right code, for two years.
• Tell customers what cannot go in, in writing.

Where DutyOS fits

DutyOS runs a public skip search where a firm lists the districts it collects in, and customers find a registered firm by postcode. The transfer note, signature and code work in situation 5 is the same product. The code SKIP3FREE takes £39 off the Operator plan each month for three months, for a limited number of skip firms.

8. You run a business that produces waste and hires a carrier

What the law says

• You have no digital waste tracking duty at all, now or in the next phase DEFRA has published. Nothing names the producer as a party with an obligation. Nobody should sell you an account for a duty you do not have.
• Your duty of care under section 34 still applies: use a registered carrier, receive a transfer note with the right description and code, keep it for two years. The Waste Duty of Care Code of Practice on GOV.UK is the government’s own guide.
• Your carrier’s registration can be checked on the Environment Agency’s public register.

What you must do

• Check your carrier is registered before the first collection.
• Keep every transfer note for two years.
• If the waste is hazardous, see situation 6.

Where DutyOS fits

DutyOS has nothing to sell you, and this page says so. If your carrier uses DutyOS, the note they give you is your record. The readiness checker answers “do I need to report” for any role and any nation in a few questions, without asking for an email address.

Who we are, and why you can check it

DutyOS Ltd is a company registered in England and Wales, number 08895470, VAT registered. We publish only what has been proven on our live service by a person, and we say so because it is the standard we would want from a compliance product.

• Listed on GOV.UK’s page “Report receipt of waste: choose a software provider” since 8 September 2026. The list is not an approval, and we never call it one.
• All 14 of DEFRA’s production approval tests passed on 19 August 2026, with no exemptions.
• DutyOS Ltd holds a Cyber Essentials certificate for the whole organisation, issued 18 September 2026 and valid for twelve months. Verify it on the IASME registry. Your records are stored in the UK, in London.
• A registered waste carrier in our own right, CBDU652456.
• Every law statement on this site names its instrument and the date we read it. When a date is a plan rather than law, we say “intention” or “target”. Made, laid or announced explains how we check.

Sources, as read: SI 2026/729 · WSI 2026/105 · SSI 2026/145 (legislation.gov.uk) · GOV.UK Digital waste tracking service page · GOV.UK Report receipt of waste (25 September 2026) · Environment Agency blog, 30 April 2026 · Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2011, regulation 35 · SSI 2014/4 · SR 2002/271 · SI 2026/873 (made 22 July 2026) · SI 2005/894 · GOV.UK hazardous waste returns supplementary guidance (19 February 2026) · GOV.UK Skip licence (23 April 2026) · Highways Act 1980 section 139 · Waste Duty of Care Code of Practice. DutyOS is a record keeping tool, not legal advice. DutyOS Ltd is independent and not affiliated with DEFRA, the Environment Agency, Natural Resources Wales, SEPA or DAERA.