Lidl: 10c for used bottles and cans [Expired]

the watchman

Is it worth it?

After even more sorting at home and taking your bottles and depositing them in the machines for refund you are only allowed to cash up to a €2 voucher in any one shop transaction.

I go supermarket shopping twice a week for all my grocery needs. I am only going to get €4 per week back. Hardly worth bothering for €4 per week. Will just put it down to another cost of living hike.....but what if you have more than €4 per week of refunds, do you have to go to supermarket every day to buy stuff and get refunds. If you don't it will be a very high cost of living hike indeed!

Insane if you ask me.

Of course the gov will have thought this through already..going to make a mint aren't they !

Rigor Mortis

Why do you think you will only get 2 quid back.

Any restriction on returns is likely only to be in very small premesis and will be a lot bigger than that.

Anyone with a Reverse Vending Machine will be looking to get the bottles and cans in, because they get a handling fee on every one of them.

loyatemu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121453782#Comment_121453782

Glass bottles are hardly more convenient, you've still got haul them off somewhere to recycle them (my waste provider used to provide a glass bin, we going backwards here).

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121454964#Comment_121454964

The €2 limit is on Lidl's trial only

Lidl's trial is giving lots of people incredibly wrong ideas of how this will work - I've seen someone else complaining that you'll only get 10c back on a 15c deposit, due to Lid's trial giving 10c.

Lidls trial is not connected to the national system. It will be replaced by the national system with the full deposit refunded and no limit.

The system isn't going to make money for the government. The Lidl trial system costs Lidl money as there are no deposits at all.

The Continental Op

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121455607#Comment_121455607

But is any retailer going to want someone with a hundred cans feeding the machine putting others off using the system?

Your only going to need to face a couple of queues to use a machine to start thinking about not bothering in future?

rob316

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121456316#Comment_121456316

I mean that's kind of the point of the system, its so much hassle to you and the extra cost that you reduce your plastic usage.

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121456316#Comment_121456316

Someone doing a huge amount at once is occupying the machine for less time than if they did multiple shorter visits.

tjhook

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121455013#Comment_121455013

Most households already have glass to be recycled, jars etc. Adding additional bottles isn't as inconvenient as managing a bag of cans with this new inconvenient system. At least for me.

Or alternatively I could buy in to this system and not bother with bringing my bottles to the bottle bank any more. Meaning minimal increase in inconvenience.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121455013#Comment_121455013

I'm already bringing glass bottles to the bottle bank. With wine and spirits, jam and various other things it's glass bottles/jars only. So I can't cut glass bottles out of my routine.

I can cut cans out of my routine no problem. Lots of beer comes in glass bottles at the same unit price as cans. So that's what i'll do. Anyone who doesn't offer their product in glass bottles loses my business, simple.

Red Silurian

I just read from the re-turn website that plastic bottles containing dairy products can't be put into these machines. This accounts for the vast majority of plastic bottles most households buy does it not?

tv3tg4

So will all cans and bottles have to come with a barcode for this system to operate?

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121457764#Comment_121457764

I don't buy any dairy products in plastic bottles.

I'd say soft drinks make up vastly vastly more of the volume of plastic bottles going around

the watchman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121451898#Comment_121451898

Exactly. In reality its just another cost of living hike for many.

the watchman

PROTEST:. Lets all send 2/3 plastic bottles to Eamon Ryan's Office. I suggest next week with a note saying Happy Christmas Eamon.

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121460227#Comment_121460227

Yes barcode on label or affixed to bottle / can.

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121460338#Comment_121460338

I don't buy any dairy products in plastic bottles.

Fair enough but most of the households in the country would have at least one 2L or 3L bottle of milk or a yoghurt drink in their weekly shopping trolley

elperello

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121460424#Comment_121460424

It's only a cost of living hike if you continue to put cans and bottles in the bin like the poster I was replying to.

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121460640#Comment_121460640

Plenty of people who buy milk never buy jug milk. Tastes disgusting, UV damages milk and the packaging is insufficiently UV opaque.

Tetra took over from reusable milk bottles for that reason, not cost!

OmegaGene

Tetra came in years ago to replace plastic containers, so much easier to dispose of and clean

raw milk here gets delivered to the door it’s much better, 1 bottle a week is loads

im sure it’s soft drinks where most bottles are going not milk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121457764#Comment_121457764

Correct. A large number of plastic milk cartons are still sold in this country. I don't know what percentage comapared to cardboard, but you can see them on the shelves of most supermarkets. Particularly the larger sizes. Same with pouring cream, mayonaise, ketchup, etc.

The clowns behind this scheme don't want any of that back because it's smelly and more work for them to clean. They want easy money, clean containers.

So you still have to maintain a household green bin for that other stuff. And that green bin still has to be collected by a big lorry. But now in addition you have to drive somewhere else to put the other half of your waste, and then they have more lorries collecting that. Fantastic for the environment.

Rigor Mortis

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121460984#Comment_121460984

although it gets taken in the green bin, tetra is a nightmare to recycle in practice and a lot of it ends up being burned. Any thing which involves multiple materials is a pain in the hoop to properly recycle.

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121461204#Comment_121461204

I believe I recall Denis Naughten, in his capacity as environment minister, a few years ago saying it would increase the price we pay our private waste collectors as they would be collecting fewer bottles and therefore making less money on our recycling.

It seems strange that they don't want the milk bottles back because of the smell but the beer cans with Guinness dregs are ok to bring back. Take a whiff off them after a few days is like smelling salts

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121461274#Comment_121461274

Aluminum is way more valuable than plastic so they put up with the smell and cleaning.

They don't really want plastic drinks bottles back, they are doing it grudgingly to maintain a facade of environmentalism. The value (of used plastic) has fallen dramatically since 2018. China stopped taking it, creating a massive oversupply in the rest of the world. It's worth practically nothing. This thing is about money, not about the environment.

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121461310#Comment_121461310

You might be right... Maybe when finished with plastic drinks bottles we should wash them with milk before returning them. See is it still about recycling then haha!

Mr. teddywinkles

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121452283#Comment_121452283

Mm is it not your money either way???

65535

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121297595#Comment_121297595

Incorrect - if that was the case the Cork 3 would be a valid 'postcode' - it's just plain 'we are Dublin so we are different than everyone else' - if it's Dublin 22 then the eircode is D22 - it's not rocket science.

It's farmed out - last week I had to contact Comreg - the Commision for Communications Regulation to tell them that (0)18049668 is NOT their telephone number and that it should read (01)8049668

but again it's the 'inside the M50' concept - the rest of us outside the M50 did not get Eircodes that follow Town/City names.

elperello

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121461917#Comment_121461917

It is, right up to the point when you throw it in the bin 🙂

Buffman

Definitely not a bargain alert any more. All this is going to cost companies a lot of money and all that will get passed on to us, the customer.

My local Lidl and many more I've seen have had the builders in for the last few months retrofitting for this scheme. In our case the trolley bay has been converted to 'inside' the building for a room for it and the whole shop entrance redone. That ain't cheap.

A recent news story quotes Tesco as spending €200,000 for a machine in ONE store, multiply that across all the shops.

Suppliers and shops now have massive new amounts of admin because the deposits have to be invoiced and paid separately to the goods.

All in all it's going to be millions that will be passed back onto the customers through higher prices.

And those of us who actually do use the green bin correctly will be further penalised as it's an almost certainty that waste collectors will up their recycling bin prices to compensate for the loss of aluminum can sales to them, one of the few items which was of value to them.

https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2023/1204/1420044-deposit-return-scheme/

"It’s quite a bigger plan than we had anticipated," said Darrin Honer, country operations manager at Tesco Ireland. "Every single store in the country has to be retrofitted, to fit in the machine. This investment for this particular store is over €200,000," he said. "To multiply that out, it’s quite a huge investment."

'The country’s drinks producers also need to sign up to the scheme - and track every single can or plastic bottle they ship.

That’s resulting in a significant amount of new administration - especially for smaller producers.

"We have to split into invoices, we have to put the deposits on the invoices separately from the cans, we have to make a return to the scheme operators in terms of how many cans have gone out," said David Walsh-Kemmis, founder and managing director at Ballykilcavan Brewing Company in Co Laois.

"I have to say we’re in favour of the scheme - we want to see as much aluminium being recycled as possible - but for a small brewery for us it really does create a significant administrative and cashflow problem."'

TheChizler

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121462019#Comment_121462019

I'm not sure what you're taking about. Dublin had postal districts before Eircode and they kept them and mostly based the first three characters on them because the D4s etc. would have a fit otherwise. Cork never had postal districts so that comparison makes no sense. This is their official postal address:

Though I'm not sure what a discussion on recycling has to do with those inside the M50 imposing terminology on the rest of us, except maybe when they define the function of a wheelie bin by its colour, when in the rest of the country this connection seems random.

Kaisr Sose

I have used the Lidl trial return machine in the Glenageary store many times. It's a convenient way to get rid of plastic bottles and aluminium cans, and in return, get up to €2 back in a voucher.

I am aware that it's an advance trial. However, as it is set up, its not without its downsides and glitches;

The machines seem quite tempremental, and frequently are out of order. If you bring bottles from car and the machine is out of order, you have to either dump them in the ordinary bin, or return them to your car before going shopping.

Cans and bottles have to be perfect/ almost 100% original shape to be picked up by machines. If dented or crushed, no chance. The first time I used the system I crushed all my cans before heading to the store ..... it's something you will only do once!

Perfect bottles and cans may be rejected, only to be accepted on the other machine, or after multiple attempts. This can be be very frustrating.

In Germany the deposit is on reusable plastic bottles which are very difficult to crush. Here, some mineral water bottles are almost impossible to keep perfect once empty.

Some plastic bottles, with barcodes, and purchased in lidl are not accepted. Eg deluxe Orange juice, other juices in PET bottles. I am unsure if the deposit will apply to these. If it does, the machines have to start accepting them.

If this system works on barcoded product only going forward, what about multipacks of cans which sometimes don't have barcodes and are sometime accepted and sometimes not?

Hopefully these issues are ironed out before Feb. Otherwise I see people saying the scheme is unworkable and just a way to charge more for plastic and aluminium packaged products.

bop1977

so this is a new pain in the hole and to add to the joy I got an email from thorntons saying they are increasing their price by $2.50 per month.

death by 1000 cuts.

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121464939#Comment_121464939

Cork did have postal districts but they had a fraction of the use of the Dublin ones

ooter

The guy from re-turn said on Claire Byrne yesterday that the retailer gets to keep any uncollected deposits, they won't be long recouping the cost of installing the reverse vending machines.

TheChizler

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121465004#Comment_121465004

Fair point, though I think they were never used by the public, I should have known someone would remember these!

TheChizler

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121466087#Comment_121466087

If that's the case I really hope the retailer isn't responsible for the upkeep of the machines, there's no incentive to keep them running if they get to keep the deposit.

That doesn't really make sense though, will smaller shops with no machines keep all the money? What if for some reason one particular machine is really popular, will that retailer be out of pocket by refunding more than they collect? I would have thought repak would manage the cash flows independently.

Rigor Mortis

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121466087#Comment_121466087

They do not. The scheme does. The retailer gets paid when the bottles come in. Once they are participating, They are the most financially incentivised for the scheme to work.

ooter

Sorry I just listened back to it, the retailer gets to keep the unredeemed tokens, re-turn keeps the unreturned deposits. He said the retailer gets 2.2c for each container which is not too shabby at all

the watchman

Its all about the money 😊

SharkMX

So when does this start?

When will I be charged a deposit on bottles I buy in the supermarket?

What kind of bottles. Glass, plastic, bean tins, soup containers, ketchup bottles?

Im confused.

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121485705#Comment_121485705

It is just beverage cans and plastic drinks bottles.

Starts 1st February I think.

https://www.bonkers.ie/blog/personal-finance/here-s-everything-you-need-to-know-about-ireland-s-new-deposit-return-scheme/#:~:text=The%20new%20scheme%20will%20come,the%20new%20deposit%20return%20scheme.

Now that it has moved on from the LIDL trial to the full roll out, there's more discussion happening here.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058316674/deposit-return-scheme-recycling

ELM327

I wonder what will happen to multipack cans with no barcode. Most all of the cans we buy are in the multipack deals in tesco.

gipi

Multi pack cans should be barcoded too - they'll also jump in price (with the deposit charged for each can)

Kaisr Sose

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121485745#Comment_121485745

You are too kind ..my reply would have been 'google ...' which would be quicker than typing the question

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121485796#Comment_121485796

Will it be a separate barcode or something? Because currently they arent barcoded.

Kaisr Sose

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121485784#Comment_121485784

In my experience, curreny some dont scan in the Lidl trial, but some do. The Lidl trial is not a live trial of the scheme

My understanding from the other thread and what I have read elsewhere, is everything will have to be barcoded and feature new labelling to indicate eligibility for the return (logo) and deposit info.

Rigor Mortis

No glass.

Drinks cans ony in metal

and PET plastic (non dairy) drinks bottles between 150ml and 3L

No ketchup bottles no meds. This is booze and soft drinks.

SharkMX

This is going to just end up being a pain in the ass.

A much better target for littering would be a 15c charge on cigarette butts. Or on disposable vapes. That would do so much more for littering than having people collect plastic and cart it back to the shop.

We recycle everything anyway. Now we just have more trips. So glad we have a car because i wont be going to the shops with a bag full of plastic bottles and aluminum cans. I'll be driving.

SOPHIE THE DOG

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121485851#Comment_121485851

I wonder if you could scan and print the label / barcode and put on older bottles cans that might be lying around?

Rigor Mortis

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121485802#Comment_121485802

All cans will be barcoded from Feb 1, single or multipack.

Kaisr Sose

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121487889#Comment_121487889

You probably could.

Are you planning on stocking up on bottles/cans between now and Feb 1..😀