Accurate information is at the heart of a quality service

The correct use of booking and cancellation of bookings systems is absolutely essential if Organic Waste is to continue improving your business.

Organic Waste operates two booking systems - one for domestic
wastes treated at the smaller regional treatment centres and one for
the industrial and commercial wastes treated at Bristol, Poole,
Holdenhurst and Trowbridge.

The regional booking system has now been operating for three years
and is well established and generally manages waste into the treatment
centres remarkably efficiently.

The second, and longer running booking system, is however beginning
to suffer. Despite booking forms having been around for a
considerable period of time Organic Waste is having to deal with an
increase in duplicate bookings, arriving without booking, cancellation
failures, poorly utilised block bookings, inaccurate volumes and
incorrect details on forms.

All of the pre-delivery booking information for industrial and
commercial waste is designed to enable the Organic Waste staff to
make the very best of the capacities that are available at the treatment
centres. Their daily calculations enable the greatest number of
customers to use the treatment centres while at the same time
ensuring the limits agreed with the sewage treatment works are
protected.

Of course there are emergencies, exceptions and genuine mistakes to
be taken into account and the treatment centres do make allowances
for these.

The most common problems are:

Duplicate bookings - brokers and sub-contractors both book in the
same waste or, on occasions, both parties cancel the same wastes
causing confusion and making it almost impossible to define the daily
volumes or loading expected. Making one party responsible for the
booking procedure will eliminate this problem overnight.

Arriving without making a booking - trying to 'squeeze in'
additional loads on top of a day's agreed booking numbers adds a lot of
additional unnecessary administration and the loads run the very real
risk of being rejected if the treatment centres' limits have been
reached. A single phone call, however late in the day, will assist on
most occasions.

Cancellation failures - sometimes there are good reasons why
Organic Waste cannot be contacted if a booking is not going to be
honoured, but in the majority of cases it is more likely to be an
administrative failure. We have reached the point where the treatment
centres regularly have as many as 20% of booked waste streams failing
to give any indication that they will be cancelled. This has a detrimental
knock-on effect to all customers.

Block bookings - as with the failure to cancel bookings unused and
non cancellation of block bookings makes daily loading calculations
difficult. Companies that fail to operate the block booking system
efficiently have, and will be, made aware of the problem and Organic
Waste are and will work with them to help improve their performance.

Inaccurate volumes and incorrect details - cause additional
administration problems. Please make sure that any and all additional
information that is sent through by fax is written with BLACK ink and
is clear and legible. Better still take the opportunity to use the
electronic systems that are available.

Rachel Creed, manager of Organic Waste said: "We are constantly
trying to improve our service for everyone's benefit and it is hugely
frustrating when systems that have worked well for so long begin to
falter.

"We have started approaching those companies that are having
administration difficulties and are offering to assist in any way we can,
in order to reduce their 'delivery load errors'.

"Poor administration adds avoidable costs to our service and the
business of our customers. It also restricts our ability to improve
services and reduce treatment costs.

"Good administration of the booking systems is at the very core of
making the best of what we have - for all our customers".

Organic Waste news - Spring 2011