FAQ
Common questions
What carriers and receiving sites ask us most about Digital Waste Tracking and how the service works.
Frequently asked questions
- What is Digital Waste Tracking?
- DEFRA is replacing paper waste transfer notes with a single national digital record for every controlled-waste movement. Instead of filling in a paper note and keeping it on file, the record is created online and sent to DEFRA's Digital Waste Tracking service. If you take waste in, CarrierNote files your receipt for each load with DEFRA today. If you carry it, CarrierNote is built to send your carrier movements the moment DEFRA opens that step.
- When does it become mandatory?
- Receiving sites (transfer stations, treatment sites, tips) go first from October 2026 in England and Wales, and from January 2027 in Scotland and Northern Ireland. Waste carriers, brokers and dealers follow from October 2027. Those are the dates to plan around.
- I run a transfer station or treatment site. What do I have to do?
- You are in Phase 1, the first group to go live. From October 2026 (January 2027 in Scotland) a permitted receiving site records every load it accepts on the digital service. CarrierNote lets you log a load at the gate in under a minute, with the arrival time and your site already filled in, and the acceptance recorded as you create it. We have written a page for receiving sites. Receiving sites.
- How long does a receiving site have to record a load?
- You have until the end of the second working day after a load arrives to complete its record. CarrierNote puts that deadline on every receipt and counts the weekends and bank holidays for you, so it lands on the right day. Waste carriers get their own Phase 2 window the moment DEFRA opens that step.
- Is CarrierNote on the GOV.UK software list?
- Yes. CarrierNote is on the GOV.UK software provider list for Digital Waste Tracking. We are connected to the live service and built to submit carrier movements the moment DEFRA opens that step, storing the Waste Tracking ID against every job. Our listing page shows where to find our row on GOV.UK, and what being listed does and doesn't mean. Our GOV.UK listing.
- Has CarrierNote been tested against DEFRA's scenarios?
- Yes. DEFRA publishes a set of test scenarios for software that sends waste records to it, and we run all 14 against every new version of CarrierNote before it reaches you. Twelve come back Pass. The other two are records the law says shouldn't exist, and CarrierNote refuses them before anything is sent. DEFRA doesn't review or mark anyone's results, so we publish ours. Our DEFRA test results.
- What does CarrierNote cost?
- There are four plans: Pilot, Standard, Pro and Unlimited. Every one does the whole compliance job, so what changes is how many people are using it, and you are never priced out of keeping a legal record. Pilot is free and stays free: ten waste movements a calendar month on real jobs rather than a demo, no card needed and no time limit. Each collection is one movement, so a van doing six pickups in a day records six. Move up whenever you outgrow it and everything you have recorded comes with you. See the pricing page for seat counts and prices. View pricing.
- What about the £26 DEFRA charge?
- DEFRA charges £26 per year per company for access to the Digital Waste Tracking service, paid directly to DEFRA. That is a government charge and it is separate from your CarrierNote subscription.
- Can I use CarrierNote offline?
- Yes. Drivers can record a waste movement with no signal at all. The record queues on the device and syncs automatically when the connection comes back. Rural tips, underground car parks, patchy 4G on an industrial estate: it all works. Put the mobile app on the phone and it opens from its own icon on the home screen. Install the mobile app.
- Is there a mobile app?
- Yes. Install it from a link in a few taps on a recent iPhone or Android phone. You do it with Add to Home Screen, which is a button in your phone's browser menu that puts a website on your home screen as its own icon. It updates itself. It works with no signal, and syncs when you're back. How to install the mobile app.
- Is it in the App Store or Google Play?
- No. You won't find it in the App Store, and that's the point. There's nothing to download from an app store and no store account to set up, so you install it straight from a link.
- Does the mobile app cost extra?
- No. The mobile app is free on every plan, including Pilot. Your plan doesn't change when you use it, so Pilot still records ten waste movements a calendar month, whether they're captured on a phone or a computer.
- Can my drivers use the mobile app?
- Yes, and each person signs in as themselves. A driver on your round normally holds a crew login, which captures and signs waste transfer notes but can't send them to DEFRA. The app costs nothing, but logins are what the plans are priced on, so the pricing page shows how many crew logins each plan includes and what another one costs. Crew login prices.
- Will the mobile app tell me when you reply?
- Yes, if you turn alerts on. The mobile app can put an alert on your phone when we reply to a support request you raised, one for each request until you open that request in the app. Alerts are off until you turn them on, from Account in the app, and you can turn them off there at any time. An alert only says we've replied, so you open the app to read it, and the email still arrives. On an iPhone, alerts only work once the app is on your Home Screen and you've opened it from there. How alerts work.
- What happens to my data if I stop using the service?
- Waste transfer notes must be kept for at least two years under the Environmental Protection Act 1990, consignment notes for hazardous waste for at least three, and financial records for six years under HMRC requirements. We will not delete those records before the retention period expires, even if you close your account. Stopping paying does not lock you out: you drop to the free Pilot plan, you can still sign in, read everything, export it and send it to DEFRA, and you can still record ten waste movements a calendar month.
- Do I still need paper waste transfer notes?
- During the transition there is a period of dual reporting. Existing duty-of-care record-keeping obligations continue alongside the new digital requirements. A system that captures the data once and satisfies both obligations removes the double-keying pain, which is exactly what we built for. What switching from a paper book involves.
Start on the free plan
CarrierNote is on the GOV.UK software provider list, connected to DEFRA's Digital Waste Tracking service. Receiving sites are in scope from October 2026 and carriers from October 2027, and you can be recording to DEFRA's standard from your first load, whenever you start.