Doncaster Council Reviews 57

Always very helpful
Terence clements

Called Doncaster council today 11/2/26 spoke to an advisor at 11.56am, waited for over 20 minutes to discuss an arrears message. I had a direct debit set up for the last year from moving in, I was nice to the advisor, he was unbelievably rude and impatient. He was not nice at all, after waiting 20 minutes I just asked for some guidance, he treated me as if I refused to my bill which I didn’t, I just asked for further explanation. It’s an awful system, I’m an advisor myself i calls every single day and I have never spoke to a customer like that. No DPA asked on call, nothing he just got rid of me as quick as possible, while I understand it’s a difficult job as I do it myself daily. It is genuinely shocking to have been spoken to like absolute trash by someone who paid to be there.

Being a part of great heritage of United Kingdom, Doncaster City Council seemed to be collecting money from public in public place in absolute unlawful and unethical manner. Starting from on-spot incident up to communications made with administrative personnel, namely, John Brooks - Enforcement Manager, Charlotte Otter - Senior Customer Experience Officer and Ms Louise Gower - Environmental Crime and Contracts Manager, had reflected a system inside Doncaster City Council to display:
1 > Manipulation in the public area,
2 > Forcing public to do environmental offense.
3 > Public life disturbance.
4 > Collecting money from public misusing the UK law.
5 > Hiding the identity while carrying out duty in public.
6 > Unable to provide a single evidence from the on-spot incident.
7 > Unable to clarify the misconduct in public.
8 > Non-disclosure of the identity of the personnel carrying out duty in public place.
9 > Wastage of time with irresponsible and vague communications.
10 > Declaring the incident as exhausted, if counter-charged for various unlawful actions in public.

This review is for highlighting the system inside Doncaster City Council. The entire disturbing and unethical incident, is described below:

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At around 8:20 am on 03/02/25, the Doncaster City Council officers blocked significant portion of area outside the Doncaster Station with blue-white tapes, resulting to littering bins not accessible if coming out from certain exit of station. A dummy bin on the ground with few hundred pieces of cigarettes had been created artificially to misguide passengers to dump cigarette residues into that manipulated bin area. Officers were blocking the way of passengers inside station to go to the platform and charging for littering offence. Officers had no identification badge displayed and wearing caps hiding full faces.

Communications had been made and asked for:
1 > That sort of manipulation in the public area.
2 > Force- Charging for littering offence while access to the bin areas was made to be restricted.
3 > Creating disruption in Public life in a Public place.
4 > Visual evidence of the bins accessible outside Doncaster Train Station during that morning, if coming out from left side exit.
5 > The reason, no visible ID document was displayed outside the uniform of the officer.
6 > Disclosing the identity, as to be displayed in public, of the officer who led the conversation.

Non-professional reply from Ms Louise Gower, included :
“no evidence of the officers blocking your way to the platforms”.
“not visible in the body worn camera footage”.
“Whilst I am unable to provide visible evidence from the morning of the offence, as I was not present at the time, I can provide a pictorial indication of the location of the litter bins provided.”
“The officer should have identified himself to you as he approached. I have no evidence of whether this did, or did not, happen”
Also the reply included image from the google map showing locations of the bins on general days and only code number of the officer “DN445”.
The gist of the reply was that there was no evidence of anything. Practically, two officers came in front of me, blocked my way to move forward, which must have been captured in body cameras of the officers.

Reply received from John Brooks was without having any letter reference number and advising the process to report the matter to Ombudsman . The reply was not only shocking, that sort of reply couldn’t be expected from any professional body of government organization. The response included these phrases -
“Unfortunately I have been unable to uphold your complaint“ /
“evidence of those bins being available isn’t something we can access for that purpose” /
“an explanation of what an officer should do in terms of identifying themselves when speaking to a member of the public was explained“ /
“The Ombudsman may decide not to investigate your complaint if you have not been significantly personally affected by the issue you are raising.”
After spending more than 30 days, John Brooks was unable to provide the information asked for and he was confident that Ombudsman might reject the case of collecting money from public with force manipulation in public area, unless the victim would be significantly personally affected. As per John Brooks, council can block the access to the bins, but council is not responsible for checking if the bins are accessible.

Reply received from Charlotte Otter - “my team cannot discuss this with you any further as the complaints procedure has been exhausted.”

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Edited 23/11/25-
To prevent this sort of unethical incident in future, Honourable Mayor of Doncaster has been informed about the incident.

rang about a missed bin collection friday4th july
was given info how to log it and informed what would happen
the bin was emptied on saturday morning
great service all round
never had any problems when contacting the council in the past

Want to thank Paddy for giving me good advice about how to get rid of plasterboard.

Only way too form a opinion on Doncaster is to visit it yourself, rough sleepers in doorways, the evidence of defication in the streets and the being constantly harassed by people begging. It's a dump

I would like to thank the council for the fantastic waste of money that they have managed on the traffic calming on brecks lane kirk sandall. I wonder how many pot holes they could of filled. I'm sure if they asked the locals which they would of prefer, the pot holes would of won hands down. I was surprised that a cycle path didn't find its way there as well.

A corrupt Council breaking the law with education and children with illness . The director of children’s services is disgrace . They run an illegal council

The people in the council office are absolutely shocking. Dont bother nothing gets done they dont help they just sit and wait until their shifts over and pass it onto to the next jobsworth. Shocking service! Treat others with no respect and no empathy whatsoever! God knows why we pay tax

Trying to complain about an idiot council worker trying to force myself and dogs off the path on Townfields @ 08:50 Friday 20th December. All I got was abuse because he stated his truck was not allowed to go on the grass. Yet expected pedestrians and there was quite a few to move out of his way including women pushing prams. This is an ongoing problem. He then proceeded to move at speed with little regard to pedestrians and churned up the grass. Totally idiot and should not hold a UK driving licence.

Yes certain departments at doncaster council require urgent improvement

We applied to St leger homes to have adaptations done last Jan
Still waiting
My partner is severely sight impaired now and going out of back door is down a slight slope with no handrail and a small brick wall raised slightly he's had a couple of falls and actually I caught my foot on it last week I'm 75 my partner is 86
We keep phoning and saying it's in hand but for how long PLEASE how can we get things sorted before something bad happens

Council are i carnt say sending a fine for taking a 7 year old on holiday in term time it was the only time available around work its not that bad child was 7 fir god sake what will he miss nothing children deserve holidays too you bunch of i carntvsay but trustvme its not nice

Since 1980 to 89, Doncaster used to be a great place to visit, especially the market, but come 2023 and now 2024 , Doncaster is a dive and and crap place to visit and even live, Doncaster council thinks more of filling there own pockets than helping the true citizens, as to this in you're face of Gay parade rubbish, And sooner rather than later, it will be a ghost town as in my eyes will never be a city, Same with St George's Church and will always be St George's Church and not a minister,
And all you see now is shops boarded up, too many beggers and especially too many unwelcome people,
Ashame on Doncaster Council as its killing it's own establishment of which was the best Town in Uk to visit, now it's not worth visiting.
Hope they can live with themselves before it's completely dead,

I have been living in this city for four years, and during this time, I have visited the municipal office multiple times seeking assistance on various matters that fall within the municipality's responsibilities. Unfortunately, I have consistently found the support provided to be severely lacking. On every occasion, the staff were unhelpful, dismissive, and failed to offer any meaningful assistance.

The inefficiency and indifference displayed by the municipal employees are unacceptable. They show little to no interest in addressing residents' concerns, and their behavior reflects poorly on the city's administration. It is deeply frustrating to encounter such a lack of professionalism and competence in a public office.

Moreover, the building itself is unwelcoming and does not reflect the purpose it serves. It fails to convey a sense of public service or responsibility, and instead, it feels like a place where residents' concerns are brushed aside rather than addressed.

I am deeply disappointed by the repeated negative experiences I have had with the municipality. This city deserves better, and I urge the administration to take immediate steps to improve both the attitude of the staff and the overall efficiency of the services provided. The residents of this city should be able to rely on their municipality for support, not face consistent neglect and indifference.

Went to Rossington tip where the workman called Andy helped us by pointing out what went where and carried a small unit as my husband and I couldn’t get it out of the car and up the ramp

No stars from me.Shocking service.
Spoke to a customer services adviser who is part of the waste and rec team.She was called Charlotte and she had a terrible phone manor and terrible manners to boot. Thank you wasn't in her vocabulary and she didn't ask if there was anything else I needed or she could do. Then rather than saying thanks and bye she just said bye. Rude and nasty and badly trained.

Rossington Tip / Recycle Centre We live in Rossington & use the Tip / Recycle Centre
We have just been to take some of our recycle rubbish & the two members of staff working today were exceptional. I spoke with one of the staff regarding recycling & he was very professional polite & very informative. I did asked for his name & job title after our conversation because he was so helpful & I told him I would be putting in a review. I would appreciate it if he gets my feed back.
His name is Alan he is the Supervisor, the centre is very clean / tidy & well organised. I would definitely recommend Rossington Recycle Centre & Alan & the staff that work there.
Monday 15th July 2024 4.30pm
Thank you Deborah & Ian Akery

My review is for Rossington tip. We had a fridge to dispose of. Andy couldn’t
have been more helpful and pleasant.

My reveiw is for balby tip .Mark who works there was extremly helpful and welcoming,it was very organised.