Waste customer onboarding checklist. A printable checklist for taking on a new waste customer — what they produce, how it is described, what containers they need and what has to be in place before the first collection.
This is the paper version. WasteOptix does the same job on a phone, with the record filed against the round and the vehicle automatically.
What is on the sheet
- Customer, sites, contacts and who signs for transfers at each
- What processes the waste arises from, and what that means it may contain
- The agreed description and classification, written once and used on every note
- Containers, locations, access, keys, codes and collection windows
- What must not go in each container, agreed in writing with somebody who can enforce it on site
- First collection date, the standing transfer note arrangement, and a review date
Why this record matters
Most waste compliance problems are created at onboarding and discovered months later. The description agreed in the first week is the description that will appear on every note for the life of the contract, and if it was written off the sales enquiry rather than off the process, every one of those notes is wrong.
Asking what the waste arises from, rather than what it is, is the change that makes the difference. A customer will say 'general waste'; the process will tell you there is a paint shop, a kitchen and a maintenance workshop on site, and that is a different conversation about containers and about classification.
Agreeing what must not go in the container, with somebody who can actually enforce it, is the control that prevents rejected loads. A clause in a contract nobody on the shop floor has seen is not that person.
The review date is there because sites change. A customer who takes on a new process has changed your waste stream without telling you, and a contract that is never revisited is a description getting steadily less true.
Use it with
- Waste transfer note templateA printable waste transfer note covering the parties, the waste, where it came from, where it is going and the declarations both sides have to make.
- Round sheet templateA printable round sheet for a collection day — the stops in order, what was lifted at each, what was missed and why, and the weights that come back off the weighbridge.
- Waste duty of care audit checklistA printable audit checklist for your own duty of care — registrations current, notes complete, descriptions accurate, sites permitted and records where you can find them.
- Rejected load recordA printable record for a load a site has turned away — what was in it, why it was refused, where it went instead and the paperwork that has to follow it.
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© 2026 WasteOptix. Free to print, copy and use in your business. Not for resale. Please keep this notice.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Written for England and Wales. General guidance, not legal advice. Checked October 2026.