What is a waste transfer note? A plain guide for UK businesses

A waste transfer note (WTN) is the document that records the handover of non-hazardous waste from one party to another. Every time your business passes waste to someone else to move, treat or dispose of, a transfer note should be completed and signed by both sides.

It exists for one reason: to prove that waste was dealt with properly. If an inspector asks how you know your waste ended up somewhere legitimate, the transfer note is your evidence.

The legal duty of care

The requirement comes from section 34 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990, usually called the duty of care. It applies to anyone who produces, carries, keeps, treats or disposes of controlled waste.

In practice the duty means you must store waste safely, only transfer it to an authorised person, and complete a written transfer note describing what was moved. The duty does not end when the lorry leaves your yard. You are expected to take reasonable steps to check the next holder is legitimate.

The transfer note is not paperwork for its own sake. It is the single piece of evidence that shows you met your duty of care at the point the waste changed hands.

What a waste transfer note must contain

A valid transfer note needs enough detail to identify the waste and everyone involved. As a minimum it should include:

• A description of the waste, written clearly enough that the next holder can handle it safely.
• The relevant EWC or list-of-waste code that classifies the waste.
• The quantity, and the type of container or how it was packaged.
• The SIC code for the business producing the waste.
• The names and addresses of the person transferring the waste and the person receiving it.
• The date and place of transfer.
• Details of the carrier, including their waste carrier registration.

Both parties sign to confirm the details are correct. That signature is what turns a description into evidence.

How long to keep them

Transfer notes for non-hazardous waste must be kept for at least two years. For hazardous waste the equivalent record is a consignment note, and those must be kept for at least three years.

You need to be able to produce these records on request. Storing two or three years of signed paper across multiple sites and vehicles is where a lot of operators come unstuck, because the note that matters is always the one that has gone missing.

Who needs one

If your business creates waste and hands it to a contractor, you need a transfer note. If you collect or carry waste, you need one. Builders, garages, offices, shops, studios and manufacturers are all caught by the duty of care, not just waste companies.

Season tickets, sometimes called a workplace recovery note or annual transfer note, can cover repeated identical collections for up to a year, but the underlying record still has to exist and be available.

Making duty-of-care evidence easier to keep

Because the whole point of a transfer note is provable evidence, how you sign and store it matters. A digital transfer note that both parties sign electronically removes the lost-paperwork problem entirely.

With Signet, each completed transfer note carries a tamper-evident audit trail and a certificate of completion, so you can show exactly who signed, when, and that nothing was altered afterwards. Anyone can check that independently through public verification, which is useful when a client or inspector wants proof without taking your word for it.

Records are encrypted and held with UK and EU data residency, and they are retrievable in seconds rather than dug out of a filing cabinet. That is the difference between hoping you can find a note and knowing you can produce it.

If you handle transfer notes regularly, see how Signet supports waste transfer notes and wider waste and recycling paperwork.

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