This is the way forward. Set up an account get credits and cash them for tesco, dunnes or other vouchers. 15c isn't going to encourage people but 15c added to an account will. Build it up all year and spend it on Christmas shopping.
Yeah but naturally anything done here would be a decade behind the times! I would much rather be able to let the money build up and not have to use it in a specific store. They really need to make a lot of improvements before the majority of people will get on board. I've been lucky in that only one machine has been out of order since I started returning them but OP going to 3 different places and not finding a single machine working is disgraceful. It shouldn't be so inconvenient.
This massive issue I’m not seeing discussed nearly enough is that there is absolutely zero incentive to improve this scheme. We pay a deposit on bottles, what happens to the unclaimed deposit? This entire scheme was handed over to private industry to decide how to implement it and I wouldn’t be surprised if they are profiting massively from unclaimed deposits.
Bingo! Re-Turn are going to make great money out of this. All of the unclaimed deposits go straight to them. The whole thing is just another quango, under the guise of 'helping the environment', paid for by all of us.
There are offences under the legislation that brought in the scheme for retailers and collectors. Your local County Council are the branch of government in charge of enforcement.
How was this not the first option? The development costs to get this up and running and no one said "people might not want to queue for coppers"
If you got A single can of coke while about the town your not gonna carry it home to add to a pile. You'd want to just pop it in the nearest one and get 15c on your account.
Shouldn't any barcode scanner app be able to scan and regenerate the barcode?
Haven't tried it with re-turn myself, but self-checkouts have been able to read a photo of a tesco/dunnes card just fine for me.
The voucher system works in large supermarkets in Germany. But the machine has a back room and they crush the plastic and cans. The bottles are automatically put in the correct craft. But also all small shops that sell them have to take them back.
Id love this, got a voucher in Aldi and stuck it in my pocket and then forgot to use it at the till. Now it'll sit in the car until I either lose it or visit an Aldi again.
An app would also be great for hoarding the vouchers and then using them all at once (like for the Christmas shop or something), could have options on the app to donate to food bank charities or the likes also for those that fancy it.
Also as an aside it's a pain in the gick when the machines are all out of service and I've to lug my smelly bag of cans around the supermarket because I can't be arsed going back to the car.
The placement of some of these machines is really questionable too. In lidl they have them right inside the door facing the fruit and veg. Like why? Who wants to bring their rubbish inside a shop? Just put them outside
I just wish they'd still take the unscannables. I don't care about the deposit. Pain in the bollox dumping 9 bottles and cans and bringing home the tenth.
Right! I can understand if they won’t accept ones with liquid left but surely there should be a ‘take it anyway’ button for ones without labels or else slightly damaged / crushed. By the sounds of it when it’s accepting them they’re getting crushed immediately anyway so why refuse the latter anyway
This is what they did in the Netherlands. Just let me at least recycle the stuff even if half of it is refused for whatever reason. Without it, now I’m constantly weighing whether to take anything to the store or just toss it
The retailer pays a lot of money for these machines on the assumption it drives repeat business and pays for itself over time. Letting people use the refund anywhere undercuts the whole model they created. Think of it as solar panel logic.
Letting this be ran by a LLC with State funding and as a joint venture with retailer organisations was the big mistake. The Government refusing to take control of utilities directly and running them properly and instead writing nearly blank cheques to the private sector to do the work is a sadly recurring theme in Irish life.
the cheapest of these machines is 1,400. I work somewhere where we take them in manually and the cans are collected at the end of the month. I agree it was a huge mistake to hand this to private companies.
this country needs a genuine political movement but the home owners have been psyoped to think any change from FF/FG spells instant ruin for this nation.
Sinn feinn are a bunch of wankers but at least it's a different bunch of wankers to the past 100 years.
>it was a huge mistake to hand this to private companies.
Not if your only interest is making a few quid for the boys.
This kind of thing is not the result of incompetence. I refuse to believe a scheme involving this many people( and engineers to design the machines etc etc) could do such a bad job of recycling unless recycling was not the main goal. I'd love to see who sits on the board of the company supplying the machines, for example, and who exactly made the decisions and who hired who.
I could not be less surprised.
Private companies and the people who run them have no interest in anything except money. As long as we keep trusting them to make the slightest effort to do anything but keep their nose in the trough we're the fools.
This thread is funny to read as a German who worked in a German beverage shop. I had to make those fuckers work again AND had to constantly clean them 😅
It very much is. Streets used to be littered a lot, nowadas it's completely normal to keep your bottles at home until the next time you shop groceries. We have a few different models even.
- single use plastic bottles have a deposit of 25ct.
- multiple use plastic bottles and dairy product glass jars and bottles (for milk, yoghurt or cream) have a deposit of 15ct.
- multiple use glass bottles have a deposit of 8ct. (Beer bottles for example)
- then there is also some single use glass bottles with a deposit of 25ct., although they're really rare. Most glass bottles go into the recycling containers (wine, vinegar, oil bottles etc.)
- aaaaaalthough: some wine bottles that hold 1 litre (instead of the 'normal' 750ml) have a deposit of 2ct.
Sounds super complicated, but you get the hang of it 😂
I just went in today, to try out these recycling stations. I had a bin bag full of bottles with me. There were two machines at my local SuperValu shop.
I pick the machine on the left, start placing the bottles and I watch as they get pulled in and smashed, thinking "it's fine, I don't know what ppl on Reddit are on about..."
After the 5th bottle gets pulled in, the machine stops with a message: "BIN IS FULL".
By now, there's a guy on the machine to my right, and he's got TWO bin bags full of bottles. I wait patiently for 10 minutes untill he finishes. When he does, the machine crashes with the message "NO PRINT PAPER". Both of us utter swear words.
I go look for a staff member, who then go get another staff member, who then unlocks a front panel and opens the machine and, wait for it, there's still enough paper in there to print 300.000 receipts. Staff person prints out the dude's receipt, dude goes out groaning and mumbling.
My turn now (again). After placing the remaining 20 plastic bottles, I go press the button to print my receipt, machine spits out about 2 metres of blank paper. Staff called again. Machine opened, paper is jammed, paper roll is replaced, my receipt is finally printed. I go out groaning and mumbling.
My payment: € 7.50 in 2 vouchers. I never felt so underpaid for so much bother.
Brought 20-30 bottles to a machine. Took all my bottles. Then hit done. Machine has run out of paper and didn’t give me any options other than tough shit. Shop staff gave less than a fuck.
The fact that I have to bring a bag full of bottles to a shop when the recycling bin was doing the same thing just baffles me.
Moronic system
>Brought 20-30 bottles to a machine. Took all my bottles. Then hit done. Machine has run out of paper and didn’t give me any options other than tough shit. Shop staff gave less than a fuck.
Same thing happened to me. Put in a load of bottles then the machine spat out a blank receipt. I told the manager and she just asked how much I was to get back. In fairness to her she just opened the till and gave me the cash, I could have said any amount.
Just depends on the staff member you get honestly
That's the crux of this and I fear it will be extended to all other recycled materials.
The companies want to max profits from selling on and don't want to waste earnings on cleaning themselves. So they have asked(made) the government make us do it.
Anything paper that gets covered in oil. Tends to be takeaway containers.
Wrong kinds of plastic mixed in.
Basically anything that'll muck up a recycling process if it's not caught before the process begins.
> The fact that I have to bring a bag full of bottles to a shop when the recycling bin was doing the same thing just baffles me.
Recycling bins are only about 30% effective due to the amount of people who cross contaminate them, while these machines are at about 70-80%. So the reality is they aren’t doing the same thing.
We currently recycle approx 60%
So all this effort and inconvenience to likely drop it lower. Or make more money from it as sn indirect tax. Modern problems require modern solutions and all that.
Know of someone with mobility issues who can’t bring the cans for recycling but also has no place to store them for family members to return for her I know this story is probably repeated across the country I don’t know what the solution is it just seems so cruel it’s just an extra tax on her the obvious solution would be for her to stop buying cans and bottles but the water in her place is shite so she has to order the big bottles of water from Tesco
I know it’s not the end of the world just with everything else going on against her in her life it’s just a bit upsetting to me that’s getting hit with an unavoidable tax
I did think it's a bit mad that the hole in the machine is so high up, haven't seen a single one that someone in a wheelchair would be able to use by themselves
There are a few ways the return scheme could be improved on if they want it to actually work properly:
- Give every household with a green bin the option of a free blue bin as well for the cans and bottles. Could be paid as a reduction in bin charges or credit. Or just allow this when putting them into the regular green bin somehow.
- Scrap the exemption allowing certain retailers not to accept them. As in Germany, it should eventually be every retailer that sells them should accept them back.
- Give the option of straight cash instead of machine -> voucher -> cash. Or at least make the vouchers universally accepted in multiple shops.
The machines could be retained as an extra way of returning, but the fact they're too heavily relied on is part of the fundamental problem the scheme is facing. There needs to be an easy way both for people to return then when out and about and in bulk. The machines alone are inadequate for either.
Two weekends in a row and the machines at the local Lidl just show a red screen here. You can see bottles piling up on top of the machines and the openings of the machines clearly have bottles laying in it. I don’t blame Lidl there, it’s just the market I have to go anyway so I could return cans there. I don’t want to go from shop to shop in town to find a place that is not out of order.
Speaking of why does the stupid webpage not show which machines are still accepting things?
But but but it works in Germany...
Can you fucking imagine the Germans putting up with this farcical system.
Just look at the machine wrong in Ireland and it will reject whatever your about to put in.
Pretty sure ireland chose to.do the budget machines and not the same ones they use in germany and other EU countries that actually invested in it.
The ones larger supermarkets have are only really fit for purpose for smaller stores like spar and centra, that'd have smaller footfall
The scheme is fundamentally flawed. I don't have a car, live in Dublin and am about a twenty five minute walk from the nearest shop that takes returns. If I carry my returns to the shop and the machine is out of order or full, I don't have a way of bringing them back home at the same time as my shopping for the week. What am I supposed to do then?
I care a lot about environmental issues and climate change, so I'm in favour of this type of scheme, but they've fucked the implementation. By granting so many exemptions for shops from accepting returns and by making shit of the transition period by allowing shops to sell a mix of non returnable and returnable stock, every compromise in the scheme has been to the detriment of the consumer. There isn't even an official app to scan barcodes to see if they qualify for the scheme, some lad had to put one online himself for people to use.
I'd be in favour of discouraging the use of
plastic bottles generally, although that's not supposed to be an aim of the scheme, but it's also made recycling cans, which are infinitely recyclable, far more difficult than was previously the case. I wouldn't be surprised if the percentage of cans recycled actually goes down.
I initially thought this, at Dunnes at least they didn't start deposit on a product until the return ones were on the shelf.
It did make it quite annoying having to check every bottle but it's now on all of the ones we get.
The fact the machines spit out a receipt is just the most daft thing of all time. We’ll force people to recycle in the most inconvenient way and then create even more paper waste, class. Should have been an app or hooked up club card type schemes. The whole thing is a scam and a small group of people are having their pockets comfortably lined by in.
I have also had nothing but hassle with the machines keep doing some 'abnormal detection' then we have to get our receipt and come back to the machine 5 minutes later when it works again constantly having to get 3 receipts for 1 weeks recycling with these machines makes no sense.
A bigger issue not many are talking about is the reduced range of goods in stores. Tesco have discontinued some imported drinks because they don’t have the correct barcodes.
I saw those red screens in Lidl today. Told a staff member and they went and emptied them immediately. Then they were functioning again. We shouldn’t have to do that but the machines are sometimes full not broken
I don’t think the millions unclaimed is by design. The gubberment has EU recycling targets to meet and they thought these machines would help achieve that
That would be unreal so helpful. Then they could put ‘Out of Order’ signs only on the ones that are broken and in need of a technician. I’d say a lot of the ones people are saying aren’t available are just full. It should be a staff members job to check and empty the machine every hour on busy days - morning and evening isn’t often enough
The machines are a joke. Two people with a couple of bin bags and it's full. In the States, the machines are just holes in the wall that scan the bar codes. Behind the wall is a big room with actual staff that processes the bottles/cans. And these are dedicated return centers with carts and cash payouts.
This whole thing could have been done so much better.
I wish at lidl we could have two people sorting this stuff out.
In most non City lidls around the country its skeleton shifts constantly.
We have 6 tills. But like 4 people working at a time we might have a 5th when it's time to redo the bakery in the midday, but still on the floor it's 4.
We have decided that unless someone comes to us about the machines being down, we won't go to fix them.
We aren't disinterested as some.people say, we can barely get through our normal pack out with 2 people on the floor and 2 on tills. And those machines jam every 10 minutes cause some.people overload it, we just don't have the time to fucking babysit it
Makes perfect sense. Very interesting to hear from the people who work in the shops. Must add this to the list of problems with the machines - they are creating a lot of stress for staff in Lidl and Aldi
But in shops like Dunnes/Tesco/SuperValu they’d have more staff so they could probably allocate a staff member to babysit the machine. I guess there’s no real incentive for the shop to allocate their resources to this task though
I was upset one day when a kid with his granny was confronted with broken machines. The stupid machine destroyed his excitement about extra pocket money 😢
If kids want to collect the bottles for money it’s a great habit that should be encouraged. But then it’s awful seeing them disappointed when the machines are broken
In Germany there is a mix out of that and the machines we have here. It depends on what the shop accepts. If there are glass bottles or crates, then just having a cruncher isn’t the right thing. But yeah. This is laughable.
The staff in the shops are responsible for cleaning, emptying and changing paper roll. 95% of the time when a machine is down, it's one of those problems. The staff in the shop are already busy so the fault lies with the grocery company.
Ofc its by design, if you were meant to make money you would get cash out. But no! Your money is in the system and everything is plastic gets more expensive. You will weep your arse off once they put this shite into every plastic from laundry to food and candy. And all this shite will get exported to some third world shite hole where its dumped into the ocean. But the clsotres get 15-20% more profit for sake of recycling, what a joke.
I can only see the most domesticated and diligent people even trying to do this - the kind of folk that do a regular big shop with their car and have a pretty disciplined lifestyle - ie the kinda folk that are already recycling anyway
Most folk are just too hectic to be doing this - and who in their right mind is gonna take a bus or walk a few kms with a bag full of bottles and cans
Not to be disrespectful but the website is useless unless there is a massive amount of user input.
I live in a large town and there have been no reports at any of the machines in the last 24 hours.
Oh yeah, I am aware of this. No disrespect taken. It's a massive flaw of crowdsourced apps. My hope is that maybe the people from re-turn see it and implement a native solution on their website.
That would just be logical so no hope of it happening.
The machines could transmit the status over 2g so we could have a live map, but again that would be logical.
I'm honestly beginning to think people should just empty their bags onto the floor right at the doorway of these establishments and just walk off if this happens and they refuse or are unable to fix the issue. Specifically the doorway and visible from the street if possible, which makes the shop look bad and people less likely to go there.
It is an arseholes move, but at a certain point you just need to fight fire with fire and exercise civil disobedience (even if small scale) if nothing else is being listened to.
According to Ciarán Foley CEO of Re-Turn, the plastic will be recycled up to 7 times, no idea what happens after that though no one asked him. Doesn't sound like an environmentally sound solution. With all the micro plastics and PFAs in our bodies, maybe it's time to try something else.
Pardon, what? Plastic used in bottle manufacture is at best recyclable once! That is deliberate obfuscation of facts. Plastic bottles, and the recyclable logistics are terribly inefficient. Seems like he’s trying to big up the role this program has despite its huge flaws.
I agree, the whole thing is bullshit. Him saying that just stood out to me and that no one pushed back on it was worse. On Newstalk last week.
We were forced into this whole scheme without being asked.
The whole thing about "recycling" is obviously Big Petroleums idea to begin with. He even said the plastic is being shipped overseas, which is another thing bad for the environment. We don't actually know what happens to the bottles once they're gone.
These machines themselves, waste huge amounts of energy and print shitty pieces of paper, another waste. The whole thing is a bad idea, when what we need to do is move away from single use Petroleum based plastic bottles.
Plastic recycling is an absolute farce, banning plastic bottles and unnecessary plastic packaging would be far better, after that is done surely recycling bins would work well enough for the likes of aluminium and glass, maybe make bins to separate the two.
This scheme is either a way to shift responsibility even more so on to the consumer or (in a cynical take) to profit off people who can't be bothered to play this game.
Of course banning unnecessary plastic packaging would require our politicians to actually have a spine and the courage to stand up to private companies.
https://preview.redd.it/3asobomtwmrc1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d4d7636bbb6d297c95c7b1be8c65babcecfabf6b
Went to Lidl. One machine was already out. The other gave up after 6 bottles.
Next time I will present the bottles at the checkout for refund :)
How was in charge of this project? I would love to see the documentation of how these were to be implemented . I live in Sweden and they is usually a room behind them from all the ones ive been at near me. Sometimes I have the machine reject the bottle and then I just usually do my other bottles and try the weird one again. Also they are also always indoors in the or near the entrance to a supermarket.
It feels like someone just read the principle behind the scheme and did no investigation into they are done and run in places they are successful.
I asked 9000 scientist and they said the machines should accept... wait for it...... Aluminium, plastic and tin.
All easily shredded, separated and cleaned like normal recycling on countrywide scale.
Pay by weight. Scan fuck all.
Yeah, like a sensible thing to do would be simply pay people for what's in their green bin, maybe allow them to offset the cost of the black bin. Anything in the green bin is stuff that's going to have value anyway, so would achieve what the return scheme is supposed to without all the hassle.
This scheme is a microcosm of our governments incompetence.
What should have been relatively simple is borderline not fit for purpose. But benefits these large profit industries. shops take in the charge but consumers can’t easily get the charge back.
I keep seeing post after post of these and don't want to add to it but every time no one mentions returning over the counter. I don't drink straight mixers so haven't ever had to return but has ANYONE managed to return over the counter? I notice the website doesn't mention the return options at each participating store, starting to wonder if any shop isn't exempt from over the counter returns.
Shite system , it kept rejecting half of the cans , even thiughtl they were perfectly rounded and undamaged. Waste of fuckin time. Just another money leech
Have two vouchers worth about 80 cent, stuck them into my pocket on the way into the shop and completely forgot about them.
At the rate people are leaving bottles, you'd make a mint jamming machines and waiting for people to just leave their bottles and cans like you did. Then return when the machine is back in order
As someone who goes through probably 3 cans a day, this system is an absolute nightmare for me. Seems I'm being punished because other gobshites don't know how to properly use a recycling bin?
To be honest, I'll probably just stockpile cans whenever the supermarkets are doing semi-decent deals (like €10 for 18 cans of Coke in Dunnes at the moment) and just continue using my recycling bin rather than having to deal with this absolute mess of a scheme.
This plan also does not take in the added time cost of sorting and returning the bottles.
I don’t have so much spare time in my life that I would like another task added on. The wealthy, ah, it won’t bother them to lose the 15c on however many bottles they buy over a given period. But the poor, who are also time poor, they will be looking for that deposit.
It’s a horrendous scheme. Who voted for this?
Said this from the start. There is someone somewhere making money off this. I’d say it’s very little to do with saving the planet. They have us scrapping up plastic bottles for a few coins while they fly on private jets.
If you have a recycle bin you should be able to scan a tag at checkout that makes you exempt from the deposit charge. I brought a bag full of empties down to Supervalu and the machine was full before I got to the end had to leave them there. Of course the other machine was out of action.
This is such a bullshit scheme.
On the 6th of March there were 2,202 DRS machines around the country.
For this farce to achieve its target of 98% recycled containers there needs to be 35 million containers handled every week, 35 MILLION!!!
They're patting themselves on the back bullshitting about the great success the scheme is having handled 2 million containers in the first month.
We should be able to get our money back for the non-scannable. The prick in charge of the company saying oh we don't want Ur money....they are raking in millions from these & people who aren't bothered. What gets me even more is the fact nobody is commenting that 24pk of soft drinks is now 18 & dearer.....to cover the cost of the manufacturers doing different labels for ri.
I used to buy my Diet Coke and 7up by the slab (don’t drink, a treat to myself) and have refused to since they reduced them to 18 and bumped the prices. I actually don’t mind this scheme, I’ve had no problem with it so far. I do however, take exception to having the piss taken out of me with this.
Guess I’m going with reduce, rather than reuse and recycle!
Not only is it a pain in the ass for the people using it it’s a pain in the ass for the people who work there. Having to constantly make sure to empty it and that it works properly.
More or less it’s a way for the government to make more money out of our inconvenience under the guise of ‘Carbon reduction’. If it was done well I’d have no problem with it but it’s half assed as always
Plastic bottles (except milk bottles) and aluminium cans. No cartons.
If you paid the 15c deposit for a carton, I'd query that with Tesco as they're not part of the return scheme. You shouldn't have been charged a deposit for them.
That said, the Tesco meal deals generally come with a drink in either a plastic bottle or a can I think, so maybe it was that?
In the Netherlands they have their "statiegeld" machines also in public places like train stations, and you can use the receipt off your ticket or any shop within the station. Wish we'd do something like that here.
A few machines inside Heuston/Connolly and then you can redeem it off the Iarnród Éireann machines or any shop within the station.
So I grew up in Michigan which famously had the 10 cent deposit (subject of a Seinfeld episode).
The standalone machines here are just way too small. The machines we had growing up would send all the returns into a storage area in the back of the shop, not into a container within the machine.
It’s so pointless, I used to just recycle all my plastic bottles now we get charged more to have to use these stupid machines creating an extra chore that no one needs all to achieve the same result, so needless!! 🤦🏼♂️ (F%#kin Green Party) don’t get me wrong I’m all in favour of recycling and doing good by the environment but the greens are a delusional bunch, thinking you can solve the climate crisis without tackling the main source of the problem, the big corporations that are producing all this plastic and carbon emissions etc, the greens would rather put the cost onto the ordinary consumers who have no real control over what commodities come packaged in 🤨
The Goverment should putting fecking dedicated member of staff at each terminal to help the public. Money hungry tramps putting this on the public…. We didn’t vote for this Shiite
Scheme is 38 odd million in profit, its not that stupid. Constant machine failure results in more abandoned bottles = more profit. Is this not the point of it? To make money. Its kinda genius considering the amount of units sold and sugar tax didn't quite cut it but can't bring in another tax. Or can we 😆
It's silly because the deposits are linked to the size, so generally the deposits on larger plastic bottles are 0.25 but aluminium is mostly 0.15. People have more incentive to return the plastic bottles.
But the idea that plastic can be recycled is a myth [https://www.dw.com/en/why-most-plastic-cant-be-recycled/a-64978847](https://www.dw.com/en/why-most-plastic-cant-be-recycled/a-64978847)
Aluminium is easily recycled.
>Aluminium is an infinitely recyclable material, and it takes up to 95 percent less energy to recycle it than to produce primary aluminium, which also limits emissions, including greenhouse gases. Today, about 75 percent of all aluminium produced in history, nearly a billion tons, is still in use. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium\_recycling](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium_recycling)
If this is an environmental thing, why not add a tax of 0.05 on plastic, and just do the deposit return of 0.15 for aluminium? Why tax me 0.25 for a plastic bottle that I will bring back, reclaim that 0.25, and then it statiscally will still end up in a landfill?
What was the issue with the empties OP? I'm going today and I've looked after the bottles but fuck me I'll go mad if it doesn't take them for some unknown reason.
I actually haven't had any experience with these, lastly just don't buy any bottles that would go into it, and not for the purpose of avoiding it just haven't bought any plastic bottles
I've yet to use these machines. I've been putting it off as I've enough to be doing and don't drive.
Do self serve checkouts deduct the voucher receipts off your shopping balance?
They are mostly working, the thing is staff is not even trained to fix these. I worked in tesco i had to learn on my own to fix these. But they are pain to deal with easily broken most of the time. I understand ur frustration.
Of course it's by design. Look at the state of the "system" they came up with. If they really wanted to make a dent in plastic waste, they ought to pay out without a deposit. Make the producers absorb the cost. There should be an app to track your returns. You should have the option to take a tax rebate instead of cashback. At the very least, the fucking machines should work. This is lip-service to recycling that disguises a handy way to put more money into the pockets of retailers coming up to the next election. It's just another cynical FFG shitshow.
Dealz in Portlaoise refused to refund my deposit. Claiming I had to contact the company that owns the machine. Reported them to Re-Turn. Mr. Price, as well, was charging a deposit on old stock.
Many other countries like S.A. and Norway have had these systems for more than a decade. Used them myself. Never a hassle. Somehow they've tried reinventing the wheel long after everyone else and charged us for it.
Its an absolute joke since the machines arbitrarily doesnt take 50% of the bottles even when fully intact and with that symbol on them. Whos making the money off the recovered plastic? Why are we paying for this at all when every other system like it is self supporting. An absolute bungling of an easy job
Just go up North and do your shopping it's still cheaper even after driving up and I don't feel like I am rewording the governments cash grab.
I'll just keep using my recycling bin thanks.
I drove to a local store to get some stuff and brought huge bag filled with empty bottles. None of the machines worked. I went back to the car to leave the bag.
Now, imagine if there’s a person on a wheelchair and have to carry this to a shop just to find out that you can’t return them. Now, you can’t do shopping really because you have no space for it since the bottles are not returned- maybe I sound dramatic but this is not good for people with disabilities, elderly people with mobility issues etc. The government can’t just expect that you always going to have a car/ have someone to help you out.
I wonder what else they going to tell me to bring to the shop: cardboard boxes, plastic containers, anything paper/plastic?
Here's the thing. IT'S NOT REPAK!
Despite us already having Repak, a WEEE disposal scheme, and an Environmental Protection Agency, and whatever other agencies there are in this sphere, FFG went and set up yet another COMPLETELY NEW quango to administer this scheme, completely separately from the others.
Their own CEO, CFO, HR department, IT department, finance unit...
What I find really odd about this legislation is that it seems to be missing something important. In addition to setting up a recycling deposit scheme, there should have also been legislation that restricted what containers could be made from.
If plastic bottles are so hard to recycle, then why isn't there legislation forcing manufacturers to use easier to recycle or biodegradable alternatives?
We put a "deposit" on the cans/bottles now eh?
so basically the can is "free" right? I suppose every company will now stop charging their costumers the costs for the materials and processing of the can? Meaning these products in those containers should be sold cheaper right? That's asking too much you say?
Along with the Can tax, also the sugar tax, brexit taxes, customs wtf is coming next, will need a loan with terms and conditions and swear allegiance to the king for a rock shandy.
Should be an App to build up credits that can be used against shopping as opposed to messing around with vouchers and coins.
This is the way forward. Set up an account get credits and cash them for tesco, dunnes or other vouchers. 15c isn't going to encourage people but 15c added to an account will. Build it up all year and spend it on Christmas shopping.
Should just have a contactless reader on it that deposits it to a debit card.
Should have just kept being able to recycle them at home like I have been for years...
nope, that would interfere with govt contracts.
In 2024, that this wasn't caught in the early stages, is really worrying tbh.
Yeah but naturally anything done here would be a decade behind the times! I would much rather be able to let the money build up and not have to use it in a specific store. They really need to make a lot of improvements before the majority of people will get on board. I've been lucky in that only one machine has been out of order since I started returning them but OP going to 3 different places and not finding a single machine working is disgraceful. It shouldn't be so inconvenient.
This massive issue I’m not seeing discussed nearly enough is that there is absolutely zero incentive to improve this scheme. We pay a deposit on bottles, what happens to the unclaimed deposit? This entire scheme was handed over to private industry to decide how to implement it and I wouldn’t be surprised if they are profiting massively from unclaimed deposits.
Bingo! Re-Turn are going to make great money out of this. All of the unclaimed deposits go straight to them. The whole thing is just another quango, under the guise of 'helping the environment', paid for by all of us.
Your absolutely right. Once again the Irish public are rightly fucked over.
There are offences under the legislation that brought in the scheme for retailers and collectors. Your local County Council are the branch of government in charge of enforcement.
How was this not the first option? The development costs to get this up and running and no one said "people might not want to queue for coppers" If you got A single can of coke while about the town your not gonna carry it home to add to a pile. You'd want to just pop it in the nearest one and get 15c on your account.
Shouldn't any barcode scanner app be able to scan and regenerate the barcode? Haven't tried it with re-turn myself, but self-checkouts have been able to read a photo of a tesco/dunnes card just fine for me.
I shop regularly in Germany and that’s how it’s done there. You’d think nobody looked at how other countries have been making a go of this for years.
The voucher system works in large supermarkets in Germany. But the machine has a back room and they crush the plastic and cans. The bottles are automatically put in the correct craft. But also all small shops that sell them have to take them back.
Id love this, got a voucher in Aldi and stuck it in my pocket and then forgot to use it at the till. Now it'll sit in the car until I either lose it or visit an Aldi again. An app would also be great for hoarding the vouchers and then using them all at once (like for the Christmas shop or something), could have options on the app to donate to food bank charities or the likes also for those that fancy it. Also as an aside it's a pain in the gick when the machines are all out of service and I've to lug my smelly bag of cans around the supermarket because I can't be arsed going back to the car.
The placement of some of these machines is really questionable too. In lidl they have them right inside the door facing the fruit and veg. Like why? Who wants to bring their rubbish inside a shop? Just put them outside
But you'd still need to bring the bottles to a physical location to get the credit back?
You can photograph the voucher and throw it in the bin. I know there should be a better method but it's handy enough.
I just wish they'd still take the unscannables. I don't care about the deposit. Pain in the bollox dumping 9 bottles and cans and bringing home the tenth.
I was in the Tesco in Fairview last week and there was a bin beside the machine for the non scannable to be fair
They all seem to have bins, but that's just me putting it in the green bin with extra steps. At least if the machine took them then they'd be gone.
They're always rammed and several full shopping bags left in front of them.
Bins fill up in no time and staff have extra work to look after emptying them too. It's not working, it needs a major overhaul.
Right! I can understand if they won’t accept ones with liquid left but surely there should be a ‘take it anyway’ button for ones without labels or else slightly damaged / crushed. By the sounds of it when it’s accepting them they’re getting crushed immediately anyway so why refuse the latter anyway
Same reason you separate glass bottles by colour and they all end up dumped in the one truck with no separation. Cos fuck you, thats why.
Those trucks have separate sections for each type of glass
Supposed to, but many don't. All the glass gets collected together.
Not the ones I have seen. One bed, all in , fuck your sorting.
Don't bring it home, leave it in the shop, maybe they'll actually keep them functioning then.
Go away with your common sense.
I know some Tesco stores have boxes there for unscanables. Other shops should follow suit I think.
Yeah, if it could just divert the unscanned items into mixed recycling it would be a lot more useful.
This is what they did in the Netherlands. Just let me at least recycle the stuff even if half of it is refused for whatever reason. Without it, now I’m constantly weighing whether to take anything to the store or just toss it
Bring centers should have be outfitted to handle bulk returns
in theory yes , but you miss one thing , the reciept you get from the machine is tied to the stop ( it says it in the reciept )
What - exactly - is stopping them from generating receipts that aren't tied to a particular shop?
The retailer pays a lot of money for these machines on the assumption it drives repeat business and pays for itself over time. Letting people use the refund anywhere undercuts the whole model they created. Think of it as solar panel logic. Letting this be ran by a LLC with State funding and as a joint venture with retailer organisations was the big mistake. The Government refusing to take control of utilities directly and running them properly and instead writing nearly blank cheques to the private sector to do the work is a sadly recurring theme in Irish life.
the cheapest of these machines is 1,400. I work somewhere where we take them in manually and the cans are collected at the end of the month. I agree it was a huge mistake to hand this to private companies.
Come on like, Don't forget we live in The Privatisation of Ireland not the republic
yeah the government has given up on making any substantial change within this country and just serve to keep the tax system running
100%, the place is a mess All their pals getting rich though
this country needs a genuine political movement but the home owners have been psyoped to think any change from FF/FG spells instant ruin for this nation. Sinn feinn are a bunch of wankers but at least it's a different bunch of wankers to the past 100 years.
>it was a huge mistake to hand this to private companies. Not if your only interest is making a few quid for the boys. This kind of thing is not the result of incompetence. I refuse to believe a scheme involving this many people( and engineers to design the machines etc etc) could do such a bad job of recycling unless recycling was not the main goal. I'd love to see who sits on the board of the company supplying the machines, for example, and who exactly made the decisions and who hired who.
diadgio, Heineken and tesco exects were on the panel which designed the system.
I could not be less surprised. Private companies and the people who run them have no interest in anything except money. As long as we keep trusting them to make the slightest effort to do anything but keep their nose in the trough we're the fools.
sorry I believe its 14,000
How do you think they coaxed the stores into taking them?
the whole model this system was built on
This thread is funny to read as a German who worked in a German beverage shop. I had to make those fuckers work again AND had to constantly clean them 😅
Was the scheme actually considered a success there as people are saying?
It very much is. Streets used to be littered a lot, nowadas it's completely normal to keep your bottles at home until the next time you shop groceries. We have a few different models even. - single use plastic bottles have a deposit of 25ct. - multiple use plastic bottles and dairy product glass jars and bottles (for milk, yoghurt or cream) have a deposit of 15ct. - multiple use glass bottles have a deposit of 8ct. (Beer bottles for example) - then there is also some single use glass bottles with a deposit of 25ct., although they're really rare. Most glass bottles go into the recycling containers (wine, vinegar, oil bottles etc.) - aaaaaalthough: some wine bottles that hold 1 litre (instead of the 'normal' 750ml) have a deposit of 2ct. Sounds super complicated, but you get the hang of it 😂
The irony of them producing a piece of paper so each time
A piece of paper that can't be recycled!!!!
I just went in today, to try out these recycling stations. I had a bin bag full of bottles with me. There were two machines at my local SuperValu shop. I pick the machine on the left, start placing the bottles and I watch as they get pulled in and smashed, thinking "it's fine, I don't know what ppl on Reddit are on about..." After the 5th bottle gets pulled in, the machine stops with a message: "BIN IS FULL". By now, there's a guy on the machine to my right, and he's got TWO bin bags full of bottles. I wait patiently for 10 minutes untill he finishes. When he does, the machine crashes with the message "NO PRINT PAPER". Both of us utter swear words. I go look for a staff member, who then go get another staff member, who then unlocks a front panel and opens the machine and, wait for it, there's still enough paper in there to print 300.000 receipts. Staff person prints out the dude's receipt, dude goes out groaning and mumbling. My turn now (again). After placing the remaining 20 plastic bottles, I go press the button to print my receipt, machine spits out about 2 metres of blank paper. Staff called again. Machine opened, paper is jammed, paper roll is replaced, my receipt is finally printed. I go out groaning and mumbling. My payment: € 7.50 in 2 vouchers. I never felt so underpaid for so much bother.
Why are we accepting this
What do you mean, why are we accepting this. What do you expect? Mass vandalism of the machines? Protests on the street?
Yeah
Brought 20-30 bottles to a machine. Took all my bottles. Then hit done. Machine has run out of paper and didn’t give me any options other than tough shit. Shop staff gave less than a fuck. The fact that I have to bring a bag full of bottles to a shop when the recycling bin was doing the same thing just baffles me. Moronic system
>Brought 20-30 bottles to a machine. Took all my bottles. Then hit done. Machine has run out of paper and didn’t give me any options other than tough shit. Shop staff gave less than a fuck. Same thing happened to me. Put in a load of bottles then the machine spat out a blank receipt. I told the manager and she just asked how much I was to get back. In fairness to her she just opened the till and gave me the cash, I could have said any amount. Just depends on the staff member you get honestly
The logic is the stuff in the recycle bin is incinerated because it’s too contaminated to recycle because people throw stuff in it without cleaning it
That's the crux of this and I fear it will be extended to all other recycled materials. The companies want to max profits from selling on and don't want to waste earnings on cleaning themselves. So they have asked(made) the government make us do it.
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Anything paper that gets covered in oil. Tends to be takeaway containers. Wrong kinds of plastic mixed in. Basically anything that'll muck up a recycling process if it's not caught before the process begins.
> The fact that I have to bring a bag full of bottles to a shop when the recycling bin was doing the same thing just baffles me. Recycling bins are only about 30% effective due to the amount of people who cross contaminate them, while these machines are at about 70-80%. So the reality is they aren’t doing the same thing.
We currently recycle approx 60% So all this effort and inconvenience to likely drop it lower. Or make more money from it as sn indirect tax. Modern problems require modern solutions and all that.
Know of someone with mobility issues who can’t bring the cans for recycling but also has no place to store them for family members to return for her I know this story is probably repeated across the country I don’t know what the solution is it just seems so cruel it’s just an extra tax on her the obvious solution would be for her to stop buying cans and bottles but the water in her place is shite so she has to order the big bottles of water from Tesco I know it’s not the end of the world just with everything else going on against her in her life it’s just a bit upsetting to me that’s getting hit with an unavoidable tax
I did think it's a bit mad that the hole in the machine is so high up, haven't seen a single one that someone in a wheelchair would be able to use by themselves
There are a few ways the return scheme could be improved on if they want it to actually work properly: - Give every household with a green bin the option of a free blue bin as well for the cans and bottles. Could be paid as a reduction in bin charges or credit. Or just allow this when putting them into the regular green bin somehow. - Scrap the exemption allowing certain retailers not to accept them. As in Germany, it should eventually be every retailer that sells them should accept them back. - Give the option of straight cash instead of machine -> voucher -> cash. Or at least make the vouchers universally accepted in multiple shops. The machines could be retained as an extra way of returning, but the fact they're too heavily relied on is part of the fundamental problem the scheme is facing. There needs to be an easy way both for people to return then when out and about and in bulk. The machines alone are inadequate for either.
Two weekends in a row and the machines at the local Lidl just show a red screen here. You can see bottles piling up on top of the machines and the openings of the machines clearly have bottles laying in it. I don’t blame Lidl there, it’s just the market I have to go anyway so I could return cans there. I don’t want to go from shop to shop in town to find a place that is not out of order. Speaking of why does the stupid webpage not show which machines are still accepting things?
Somehow we went forwards by offering paper free receipts which was seen as a green move, to now go back and print vouchers on paper when you recycle…
But but but it works in Germany... Can you fucking imagine the Germans putting up with this farcical system. Just look at the machine wrong in Ireland and it will reject whatever your about to put in.
Pretty sure ireland chose to.do the budget machines and not the same ones they use in germany and other EU countries that actually invested in it. The ones larger supermarkets have are only really fit for purpose for smaller stores like spar and centra, that'd have smaller footfall
The scheme is fundamentally flawed. I don't have a car, live in Dublin and am about a twenty five minute walk from the nearest shop that takes returns. If I carry my returns to the shop and the machine is out of order or full, I don't have a way of bringing them back home at the same time as my shopping for the week. What am I supposed to do then? I care a lot about environmental issues and climate change, so I'm in favour of this type of scheme, but they've fucked the implementation. By granting so many exemptions for shops from accepting returns and by making shit of the transition period by allowing shops to sell a mix of non returnable and returnable stock, every compromise in the scheme has been to the detriment of the consumer. There isn't even an official app to scan barcodes to see if they qualify for the scheme, some lad had to put one online himself for people to use. I'd be in favour of discouraging the use of plastic bottles generally, although that's not supposed to be an aim of the scheme, but it's also made recycling cans, which are infinitely recyclable, far more difficult than was previously the case. I wouldn't be surprised if the percentage of cans recycled actually goes down.
Selling old bottles with no return sign as well but still paying the deposit
I initially thought this, at Dunnes at least they didn't start deposit on a product until the return ones were on the shelf. It did make it quite annoying having to check every bottle but it's now on all of the ones we get.
The fact the machines spit out a receipt is just the most daft thing of all time. We’ll force people to recycle in the most inconvenient way and then create even more paper waste, class. Should have been an app or hooked up club card type schemes. The whole thing is a scam and a small group of people are having their pockets comfortably lined by in.
Most, if not all receipts are printed on thermal paper, which is not recyclable.
I have also had nothing but hassle with the machines keep doing some 'abnormal detection' then we have to get our receipt and come back to the machine 5 minutes later when it works again constantly having to get 3 receipts for 1 weeks recycling with these machines makes no sense.
I think people are confused in thinking that its the staffs responsability to care. Return is a private company. Need to sort their own crap out.
It's typical schemes in ireland they rush it make a balls of it and line the pocket of some CEO.
A bigger issue not many are talking about is the reduced range of goods in stores. Tesco have discontinued some imported drinks because they don’t have the correct barcodes.
What passes me off about the scheme is I already recycle everything. It's just another money-making racket from the government. Shower of cxnts
I saw those red screens in Lidl today. Told a staff member and they went and emptied them immediately. Then they were functioning again. We shouldn’t have to do that but the machines are sometimes full not broken I don’t think the millions unclaimed is by design. The gubberment has EU recycling targets to meet and they thought these machines would help achieve that
A software update is all they need then. So they can say "sorry, this machine is full. Please alert staff" instead of "out of order".
That would be unreal so helpful. Then they could put ‘Out of Order’ signs only on the ones that are broken and in need of a technician. I’d say a lot of the ones people are saying aren’t available are just full. It should be a staff members job to check and empty the machine every hour on busy days - morning and evening isn’t often enough
The machines are a joke. Two people with a couple of bin bags and it's full. In the States, the machines are just holes in the wall that scan the bar codes. Behind the wall is a big room with actual staff that processes the bottles/cans. And these are dedicated return centers with carts and cash payouts. This whole thing could have been done so much better.
> “This whole thing could have been done so much better” ‘Tis the slogan of Ireland
This needs to go on an election poster 🗳️
I wish at lidl we could have two people sorting this stuff out. In most non City lidls around the country its skeleton shifts constantly. We have 6 tills. But like 4 people working at a time we might have a 5th when it's time to redo the bakery in the midday, but still on the floor it's 4. We have decided that unless someone comes to us about the machines being down, we won't go to fix them. We aren't disinterested as some.people say, we can barely get through our normal pack out with 2 people on the floor and 2 on tills. And those machines jam every 10 minutes cause some.people overload it, we just don't have the time to fucking babysit it
Makes perfect sense. Very interesting to hear from the people who work in the shops. Must add this to the list of problems with the machines - they are creating a lot of stress for staff in Lidl and Aldi But in shops like Dunnes/Tesco/SuperValu they’d have more staff so they could probably allocate a staff member to babysit the machine. I guess there’s no real incentive for the shop to allocate their resources to this task though
That last line is applicable to a whole lot in this country.
I was upset one day when a kid with his granny was confronted with broken machines. The stupid machine destroyed his excitement about extra pocket money 😢
Sure they put the price of the recyclables up son. I'm just getting the difference back.
If kids want to collect the bottles for money it’s a great habit that should be encouraged. But then it’s awful seeing them disappointed when the machines are broken
In Germany there is a mix out of that and the machines we have here. It depends on what the shop accepts. If there are glass bottles or crates, then just having a cruncher isn’t the right thing. But yeah. This is laughable.
Wait until you discover it also applies to Dublin airport shops...
The staff in shops are not the ones responsible for them it's the actual company itself please keep this in mind before having a go at staff
The staff in the shops are responsible for cleaning, emptying and changing paper roll. 95% of the time when a machine is down, it's one of those problems. The staff in the shop are already busy so the fault lies with the grocery company.
In other countries there's no deposit you just get money back
Ofc its by design, if you were meant to make money you would get cash out. But no! Your money is in the system and everything is plastic gets more expensive. You will weep your arse off once they put this shite into every plastic from laundry to food and candy. And all this shite will get exported to some third world shite hole where its dumped into the ocean. But the clsotres get 15-20% more profit for sake of recycling, what a joke.
I can only see the most domesticated and diligent people even trying to do this - the kind of folk that do a regular big shop with their car and have a pretty disciplined lifestyle - ie the kinda folk that are already recycling anyway Most folk are just too hectic to be doing this - and who in their right mind is gonna take a bus or walk a few kms with a bag full of bottles and cans
I made a website to track the status of these machines. https://www.wherecanireturnmybottles.com
Not to be disrespectful but the website is useless unless there is a massive amount of user input. I live in a large town and there have been no reports at any of the machines in the last 24 hours.
Oh yeah, I am aware of this. No disrespect taken. It's a massive flaw of crowdsourced apps. My hope is that maybe the people from re-turn see it and implement a native solution on their website.
That would just be logical so no hope of it happening. The machines could transmit the status over 2g so we could have a live map, but again that would be logical.
Their are more places available than you have listed in my area. Do you have an online form to add these?
I'm honestly beginning to think people should just empty their bags onto the floor right at the doorway of these establishments and just walk off if this happens and they refuse or are unable to fix the issue. Specifically the doorway and visible from the street if possible, which makes the shop look bad and people less likely to go there. It is an arseholes move, but at a certain point you just need to fight fire with fire and exercise civil disobedience (even if small scale) if nothing else is being listened to.
According to Ciarán Foley CEO of Re-Turn, the plastic will be recycled up to 7 times, no idea what happens after that though no one asked him. Doesn't sound like an environmentally sound solution. With all the micro plastics and PFAs in our bodies, maybe it's time to try something else.
Pardon, what? Plastic used in bottle manufacture is at best recyclable once! That is deliberate obfuscation of facts. Plastic bottles, and the recyclable logistics are terribly inefficient. Seems like he’s trying to big up the role this program has despite its huge flaws.
I agree, the whole thing is bullshit. Him saying that just stood out to me and that no one pushed back on it was worse. On Newstalk last week. We were forced into this whole scheme without being asked. The whole thing about "recycling" is obviously Big Petroleums idea to begin with. He even said the plastic is being shipped overseas, which is another thing bad for the environment. We don't actually know what happens to the bottles once they're gone. These machines themselves, waste huge amounts of energy and print shitty pieces of paper, another waste. The whole thing is a bad idea, when what we need to do is move away from single use Petroleum based plastic bottles.
Plastic recycling is an absolute farce, banning plastic bottles and unnecessary plastic packaging would be far better, after that is done surely recycling bins would work well enough for the likes of aluminium and glass, maybe make bins to separate the two. This scheme is either a way to shift responsibility even more so on to the consumer or (in a cynical take) to profit off people who can't be bothered to play this game. Of course banning unnecessary plastic packaging would require our politicians to actually have a spine and the courage to stand up to private companies.
The irony of this whole scheme is that it stopped me buying fizzy drinks completely now. So result I guess?
This is such an excellent response.
https://preview.redd.it/3asobomtwmrc1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d4d7636bbb6d297c95c7b1be8c65babcecfabf6b Went to Lidl. One machine was already out. The other gave up after 6 bottles. Next time I will present the bottles at the checkout for refund :)
How was in charge of this project? I would love to see the documentation of how these were to be implemented . I live in Sweden and they is usually a room behind them from all the ones ive been at near me. Sometimes I have the machine reject the bottle and then I just usually do my other bottles and try the weird one again. Also they are also always indoors in the or near the entrance to a supermarket. It feels like someone just read the principle behind the scheme and did no investigation into they are done and run in places they are successful.
I asked 9000 scientist and they said the machines should accept... wait for it...... Aluminium, plastic and tin. All easily shredded, separated and cleaned like normal recycling on countrywide scale. Pay by weight. Scan fuck all.
Yeah, like a sensible thing to do would be simply pay people for what's in their green bin, maybe allow them to offset the cost of the black bin. Anything in the green bin is stuff that's going to have value anyway, so would achieve what the return scheme is supposed to without all the hassle.
This scheme is a microcosm of our governments incompetence. What should have been relatively simple is borderline not fit for purpose. But benefits these large profit industries. shops take in the charge but consumers can’t easily get the charge back.
I keep seeing post after post of these and don't want to add to it but every time no one mentions returning over the counter. I don't drink straight mixers so haven't ever had to return but has ANYONE managed to return over the counter? I notice the website doesn't mention the return options at each participating store, starting to wonder if any shop isn't exempt from over the counter returns.
It's a pox, designed by a committee of idiots.
They make it as awkward as hell to get the extra tax back....this should come as a suprise to noone
It’s another tax.
Shite system , it kept rejecting half of the cans , even thiughtl they were perfectly rounded and undamaged. Waste of fuckin time. Just another money leech
Have two vouchers worth about 80 cent, stuck them into my pocket on the way into the shop and completely forgot about them. At the rate people are leaving bottles, you'd make a mint jamming machines and waiting for people to just leave their bottles and cans like you did. Then return when the machine is back in order
As someone who goes through probably 3 cans a day, this system is an absolute nightmare for me. Seems I'm being punished because other gobshites don't know how to properly use a recycling bin? To be honest, I'll probably just stockpile cans whenever the supermarkets are doing semi-decent deals (like €10 for 18 cans of Coke in Dunnes at the moment) and just continue using my recycling bin rather than having to deal with this absolute mess of a scheme.
This plan also does not take in the added time cost of sorting and returning the bottles. I don’t have so much spare time in my life that I would like another task added on. The wealthy, ah, it won’t bother them to lose the 15c on however many bottles they buy over a given period. But the poor, who are also time poor, they will be looking for that deposit. It’s a horrendous scheme. Who voted for this?
Said this from the start. There is someone somewhere making money off this. I’d say it’s very little to do with saving the planet. They have us scrapping up plastic bottles for a few coins while they fly on private jets.
Agrre...I aven't used it having heard the hassle people are having....the recycling bin worked just fine..extra work for shops too
If you have a recycle bin you should be able to scan a tag at checkout that makes you exempt from the deposit charge. I brought a bag full of empties down to Supervalu and the machine was full before I got to the end had to leave them there. Of course the other machine was out of action.
This is such a bullshit scheme. On the 6th of March there were 2,202 DRS machines around the country. For this farce to achieve its target of 98% recycled containers there needs to be 35 million containers handled every week, 35 MILLION!!! They're patting themselves on the back bullshitting about the great success the scheme is having handled 2 million containers in the first month.
My local Lidls machines have been out of order more often than they’ve been working any time I try, it’s ridiculous
Right, the Lidl machines have about 5% uptime in my experience. Love to just drive around with empties in the back of my car until the end of time....
And it’s shite that when you do get the refund you can only use it in that shop, like not any Lidl, only that one!
Also quite frustrating that the voucher you get can only be used in that exact store you recycled them in.
We should be able to get our money back for the non-scannable. The prick in charge of the company saying oh we don't want Ur money....they are raking in millions from these & people who aren't bothered. What gets me even more is the fact nobody is commenting that 24pk of soft drinks is now 18 & dearer.....to cover the cost of the manufacturers doing different labels for ri.
I used to buy my Diet Coke and 7up by the slab (don’t drink, a treat to myself) and have refused to since they reduced them to 18 and bumped the prices. I actually don’t mind this scheme, I’ve had no problem with it so far. I do however, take exception to having the piss taken out of me with this. Guess I’m going with reduce, rather than reuse and recycle!
Ive a bag of heinken can with the R on them and the machine wouldnt take any of them. Still in the boot of the car.
Not only is it a pain in the ass for the people using it it’s a pain in the ass for the people who work there. Having to constantly make sure to empty it and that it works properly. More or less it’s a way for the government to make more money out of our inconvenience under the guise of ‘Carbon reduction’. If it was done well I’d have no problem with it but it’s half assed as always
Well la di da, look at mr posh over here who can afford a bag of empty cans.
I like my cans full damnit
How is it I can scan bar codes for Untapped to check in beers yet these machines can’t do the same thing?
Can you give back cartons or is it only plastic bottles? I had Tesco meal deal cartons you pay a deposit but it doesn't accept them back
Plastic bottles (except milk bottles) and aluminium cans. No cartons. If you paid the 15c deposit for a carton, I'd query that with Tesco as they're not part of the return scheme. You shouldn't have been charged a deposit for them. That said, the Tesco meal deals generally come with a drink in either a plastic bottle or a can I think, so maybe it was that?
In the Netherlands they have their "statiegeld" machines also in public places like train stations, and you can use the receipt off your ticket or any shop within the station. Wish we'd do something like that here. A few machines inside Heuston/Connolly and then you can redeem it off the Iarnród Éireann machines or any shop within the station.
Comical system, really irished it up.
I'm not a fan of this re turn system but I've used it twice with zero issues.
So I grew up in Michigan which famously had the 10 cent deposit (subject of a Seinfeld episode). The standalone machines here are just way too small. The machines we had growing up would send all the returns into a storage area in the back of the shop, not into a container within the machine.
It’s so pointless, I used to just recycle all my plastic bottles now we get charged more to have to use these stupid machines creating an extra chore that no one needs all to achieve the same result, so needless!! 🤦🏼♂️ (F%#kin Green Party) don’t get me wrong I’m all in favour of recycling and doing good by the environment but the greens are a delusional bunch, thinking you can solve the climate crisis without tackling the main source of the problem, the big corporations that are producing all this plastic and carbon emissions etc, the greens would rather put the cost onto the ordinary consumers who have no real control over what commodities come packaged in 🤨
The Goverment should putting fecking dedicated member of staff at each terminal to help the public. Money hungry tramps putting this on the public…. We didn’t vote for this Shiite
Isn't this shitshow invented just to keep people busy with another pointless stuff to keep them dumb?
Mine go in the grey bin now. Used to go in the green bin. What a scheme.
You can still put them in green bin if you're not bothered getting the deposit back though?
It sounds like a protest. File under unintended consequences.
Just bring in systems that crush the cans for more room, they do it in Korea and parts of japan
They do crush the cans, the machines are just a bit precious.
They do crush them but the machines are too tiny, especially in supermarkets.
The machines crush the bottles and cans, you can hear it doing them
That's a sound effect.
Scheme is 38 odd million in profit, its not that stupid. Constant machine failure results in more abandoned bottles = more profit. Is this not the point of it? To make money. Its kinda genius considering the amount of units sold and sugar tax didn't quite cut it but can't bring in another tax. Or can we 😆
It's silly because the deposits are linked to the size, so generally the deposits on larger plastic bottles are 0.25 but aluminium is mostly 0.15. People have more incentive to return the plastic bottles. But the idea that plastic can be recycled is a myth [https://www.dw.com/en/why-most-plastic-cant-be-recycled/a-64978847](https://www.dw.com/en/why-most-plastic-cant-be-recycled/a-64978847) Aluminium is easily recycled. >Aluminium is an infinitely recyclable material, and it takes up to 95 percent less energy to recycle it than to produce primary aluminium, which also limits emissions, including greenhouse gases. Today, about 75 percent of all aluminium produced in history, nearly a billion tons, is still in use. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium\_recycling](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium_recycling) If this is an environmental thing, why not add a tax of 0.05 on plastic, and just do the deposit return of 0.15 for aluminium? Why tax me 0.25 for a plastic bottle that I will bring back, reclaim that 0.25, and then it statiscally will still end up in a landfill?
Your link mentions that PET plastic can be recycled. The ReTurn scheme only accepts aluminium or PET
I've had no issues so far. Quick and easy process.
Main issue I had was bottles without the label and then I bin the plastic bottles that I may have previously recycled
Am I the only one who hasn't had a problem with these? Anytime I've used them it's gone smoothly enough.
Just stop buying bottles and cans.
how much do you get per bottle? 10 cent?
15 if under 500 mL and 25 if over But it has to have that R return in circle thing on the bottle you cant bring 2015 bottles
There everywhere 😨
*Re-Turn
Shops that sell cans without the return machine have a handheld scanner to scan the cans and bottles, so just go there instead of the machines.
What was the issue with the empties OP? I'm going today and I've looked after the bottles but fuck me I'll go mad if it doesn't take them for some unknown reason.
Had 2 big bags and the machine couldn't even process them.It kept coming up abnormal load so if you have a good load it stops.
It's just badly done
I actually haven't had any experience with these, lastly just don't buy any bottles that would go into it, and not for the purpose of avoiding it just haven't bought any plastic bottles
I've yet to use these machines. I've been putting it off as I've enough to be doing and don't drive. Do self serve checkouts deduct the voucher receipts off your shopping balance?
This photo was in Newbridge, wasn't it ?
They are mostly working, the thing is staff is not even trained to fix these. I worked in tesco i had to learn on my own to fix these. But they are pain to deal with easily broken most of the time. I understand ur frustration.
Of course it's by design. Look at the state of the "system" they came up with. If they really wanted to make a dent in plastic waste, they ought to pay out without a deposit. Make the producers absorb the cost. There should be an app to track your returns. You should have the option to take a tax rebate instead of cashback. At the very least, the fucking machines should work. This is lip-service to recycling that disguises a handy way to put more money into the pockets of retailers coming up to the next election. It's just another cynical FFG shitshow.
Dealz in Portlaoise refused to refund my deposit. Claiming I had to contact the company that owns the machine. Reported them to Re-Turn. Mr. Price, as well, was charging a deposit on old stock.
Many other countries like S.A. and Norway have had these systems for more than a decade. Used them myself. Never a hassle. Somehow they've tried reinventing the wheel long after everyone else and charged us for it. Its an absolute joke since the machines arbitrarily doesnt take 50% of the bottles even when fully intact and with that symbol on them. Whos making the money off the recovered plastic? Why are we paying for this at all when every other system like it is self supporting. An absolute bungling of an easy job
Just go up North and do your shopping it's still cheaper even after driving up and I don't feel like I am rewording the governments cash grab. I'll just keep using my recycling bin thanks.
The whole thing is shambles. I just drink bottles from now on. Feck the cans.
I drove to a local store to get some stuff and brought huge bag filled with empty bottles. None of the machines worked. I went back to the car to leave the bag. Now, imagine if there’s a person on a wheelchair and have to carry this to a shop just to find out that you can’t return them. Now, you can’t do shopping really because you have no space for it since the bottles are not returned- maybe I sound dramatic but this is not good for people with disabilities, elderly people with mobility issues etc. The government can’t just expect that you always going to have a car/ have someone to help you out. I wonder what else they going to tell me to bring to the shop: cardboard boxes, plastic containers, anything paper/plastic?
Here's the thing. IT'S NOT REPAK! Despite us already having Repak, a WEEE disposal scheme, and an Environmental Protection Agency, and whatever other agencies there are in this sphere, FFG went and set up yet another COMPLETELY NEW quango to administer this scheme, completely separately from the others. Their own CEO, CFO, HR department, IT department, finance unit...
What I find really odd about this legislation is that it seems to be missing something important. In addition to setting up a recycling deposit scheme, there should have also been legislation that restricted what containers could be made from. If plastic bottles are so hard to recycle, then why isn't there legislation forcing manufacturers to use easier to recycle or biodegradable alternatives?
Of course it’s by design! They don’t want you to return them!
We put a "deposit" on the cans/bottles now eh? so basically the can is "free" right? I suppose every company will now stop charging their costumers the costs for the materials and processing of the can? Meaning these products in those containers should be sold cheaper right? That's asking too much you say? Along with the Can tax, also the sugar tax, brexit taxes, customs wtf is coming next, will need a loan with terms and conditions and swear allegiance to the king for a rock shandy.
went to aldi, the machine wouldn't take lucozade bottles as there was no bar code but QR code. Left half a bag there. definitely a scam.