HUNDREDS of Ipswich residents are bemused today after being told their black bins will not be emptied until next week.But their new blue bins – for paper, plastic and tins - were due to be emptied within 48 hours of being delivered.

HUNDREDS of Ipswich residents are bemused today after being told their black bins will not be emptied until next week.

But their new blue bins – for paper, plastic and tins - were due to be emptied within 48 hours of being delivered.

Many residents had their blue bins delivered on Wednesday and were informed that they would be emptied today – just two days later.

Julie Aleksic, 38, of Lister Road, Ipswich, had her new blue bin delivered on Wednesday.

She said: "It will be collected today. But we are concerned that we will have the black bin full of nappies.

"So we will probably have to take a trip to the dump.

"I think it is a very good idea [to have blue bins]. But it would definitely be better to have collected the black bin this week and the blue one next week – because at the moment the blue one is sitting empty."

Margaret Poole, 77, of Westbourne Road, Ipswich is also having her bin collected today – two days after it was delivered.

She said: "I had already got all the rubbish ready. I had to take out all the rubbish and re-sort it. I had thought that they wouldn't collect the blue bins this week.

"As it is just me, I don't have a lot of rubbish. But families would have a lot more rubbish and they would have a problem."

The situation came about as Ipswich Borough Council launched its pilot scheme to encourage residents to recycle more of their waste.

The borough council delivered 5,500 blue wheelie bins to homes in the Rushmere, Whitehouse, California and Bramford Lane areas of town.

They are only for paper, tins and plastic and are collected every two weeks.

Meanwhile traditional black bins, residents were told, would now only be emptied every fortnight. But the recycling scheme got off to a faltering start.

The manufacturers were late in delivering many of the blue bins – and so 1,300 homes received their blue bins a week late.

But many of these were still scheduled to have a blue bin collection this week.

The borough council has apologised for the inconvenience.

A letter from the borough council's recycling team was sent to the affected homes.

It read: "As we recognise that you will not have had much time to use your blue bin and thus your black bin may be rather full, we will take extra 'black bin' waste the following week when your black bin is emptied.

"Extra black bin waste will be collected only for the next black bin collection. Extra waste will not be collected in following weeks."

Anyone with questions regarding their first collection date should call the recycling helpline on 433070.