Renfrewshire Council dealt with 11,805 complaints during 2025/26 as the number of cases continued to rise.
The figures were presented to the council’s Audit, Risk and Scrutiny Board on Monday 21st September 2026.
The total increased by 892 from 10,913 in 2024/25. The council dealt with 10,025 complaints in 2023/24.
More than three-quarters of frontline complaints were upheld. The proportion increased from 71.6% in 2024/25 to 77.5% in 2025/26.
Environment, Housing and Infrastructure handled 10,759 complaints, representing 91.1% of all cases recorded during the year.
However, a table elsewhere in the same report gives the Environment, Housing and Infrastructure total as 10,754.
Waste services generated 7,337 complaints. Responsive Repairs accounted for 1,167, followed by 866 concerning StreetScene and Land Services, 600 about Building Services and 369 involving Roads and Transportation.
The council said the waste complaints represented around 0.1% of approximately 7.54million bin collections.
The report linked those Waste Services cases to bin collections but did not break the 7,337 complaints down into missed bins, assisted collections or other waste issues.
Lindsay Hepburn, senior manager for neighbourhood services, told councillors that the service currently receives around 30 to 40 missed-bin reports each day.
Before recent improvement work, around 30% of these reports concerned assisted collections for residents who require help moving their bins.
The council appointed a dedicated officer to examine repeated problems with assisted collections. Crews received further training and new routing software was introduced.
Officers said provisional figures covering the first four months of the work showed complaints about assisted collections had fallen by around 20%.
A table in the report showed Children’s Services complaints increasing from 188 to 349. However, another section of the same report said the service dealt with 363 complaints during 2025/26.
Officers said the increase was partly because the central complaints system had been tested in some schools, leading to more cases being formally recorded.
Complaints handled directly by schools and early years establishments are not yet fully included in the council’s figures.
Despite the increased volume, response times improved.
The average time taken to answer a frontline complaint fell from 8.1 working days to 5.8 days. The target is five working days.
The average response time for more complex investigation complaints fell from 23.1 days to 15.7 days, within the 20-day target.
Around 76.6% of frontline complaints and 79.5% of investigation complaints were completed within their target timescales.
The council received 1,698 Freedom of Information requests and 9,398 elected member enquiries during 2025/26. Performance was above target in both areas.
The Audit, Risk and Scrutiny Board noted the complaints report.
Renfrewshire Council’s five most complained-about reasons in 2025/26:
| Service | Complaints |
|---|---|
| Waste Services | 7,337 |
| Responsive Repairs | 1,167 |
| StreetScene and Land Services | 866 |
| Building Services | 600 |
| Roads and Transportation | 369 |