WITH reference to the reader from Padgate and her bin collection being two weeks late. We can beat that.

Our last collection was December 18. We missed two weeks (Christmas Day and New Year Day) as obviously they are bank holidays. However the following week, the snow came and no bins were collected as the roads were too dangerous for cars let alone bin lorries.

The following week, the snow had gone and the rain came and washed the remainder away. The Guardian said the bin men would come but they didn’t. Last week no snow, no rain, no bank holidays, everyone put out their blue and black bins as instructed but there was no collection.

The bins stayed out all weekend and the following week, just in case they came on a different day – no such luck.

On January 22 our black bin was emptied but not our blue bin.

Finally, after five weeks, we have had our bins emptied. Luckily we have transport, so we took our extra rubbish to the tip.

Will we get a reduction in our bill for being without a collection for five weeks? If not can we send in a claim for our petrol expenses for the journeys back and forth to the tip?

We are a family of five and like a lot of other people with the Christmas and New Year rubbish our bins were overflowing. We would like to know, why they did not turn up on January 15 when there was no excuse?

Obviously as the binmen realised just how much we missed them and to make sure we knew they had been, they did their usual party trick of leaving the black bin right behind our car so we cannot get off the drive without moving it. Week in, week out, they do it.

The drive isn’t tiny and we always leave the bin to one side, but they seem incapable of doing the same. No wonder they don’t bother coming round for a Christmas tip any more.

THE GREENALL FAMILY Great Sankey