What Digital Waste Tracking is
Digital Waste Tracking (DWT) is the UK government service that records every movement of waste, run by Defra (the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs). From 1 October 2026 every licensed or permitted waste receiving site in the UK must report each day's received waste to Defra, and must do so within two working days of receiving it.
RecyclyERP builds that report for you from the loads you have already booked in, so you are not re-typing anything. Anything you have recorded as not arriving as waste, such as equipment couriered in for re-use, is left off it. You review it, generate the file in Defra's own format, and upload it. Nothing is ever sent to Defra automatically.
This applies to UK sites only. If your company's country is not the United Kingdom you will not see any of these screens.
Before you start: one-off setup
Do this once. After that the daily routine takes a couple of minutes.
- Switch it on. Users & Settings > Settings > Inbound > Digital Waste Tracking (UK) > tick "Enable Digital Waste Tracking export". The section only appears when your company's country is set to United Kingdom.
- Enter your site permit number. On your company record, fill in "Waste Management Licence No (Site Permit Number)". Defra call this the Receiver's authorisation number and it appears on every report.
- Enter your waste carrier licence number on your company record, for loads you collect on your own vehicles.
- Set your default means of transport (normally Road). You can override it per return.
- Map your Item Processing Actions to Defra codes. Logistics & Inventory > Configuration > Item Processing Actions. Give each one its "Defra Disposal / Recovery Code", for example Recycle = R13, Parts Harvest = R12, Scrap = D15. R codes are recovery, D codes are disposal.
- Map your Package Types to Defra container types. Logistics & Inventory > Configuration > Package Types. For example a pallet cage maps to "[CAR] Carrier (for example, pallet cage)" and a skip maps to "[SKI] Skip".
- Check your EWC Codes. Asset Types & Services > Configuration > EWC Codes. Each code needs a Physical Form (normally Solid). Any code marked hazardous also needs its Default HP Codes (hazardous property codes, for example HP_6 Acute Toxicity). Tick "May Contain POPs" on any waste that can contain persistent organic pollutants, which are slow-degrading toxic chemicals found in some electrical plastics.
- Say which deliveries are not waste, if any of your clients send you equipment for re-use rather than disposal. See "Deliveries that are not waste" below. You can skip this step: anything you do not set is treated as waste, exactly as before.
Your daily routine
Logistics & Inventory > Operations > DWT Export.
- The screen opens on today's date and lists every load received that day, one row per load per waste code. Anything recorded as not arriving as waste is left off and shown on the Excluded tab instead.
- Read the Missing Info column. It names anything Defra require that is not yet recorded. Fix it on the record it belongs to, then click Refresh.
- Click Generate Defra Spreadsheet. The file downloads in Defra's own format.
- Upload it at Defra's "Report receipt of waste" service.
- Come back and click Mark Day as Submitted to Defra. This is what tells RecyclyERP the day is done, and it is what the daily reminder checks.
Deliveries that are not waste
Not everything that arrives is waste. A client who sends you laptops by courier for re-use is transferring assets to you, so that delivery is an asset transfer and not a waste movement. It should not appear on your Defra return at all. RecyclyERP lets you record that, and keeps those items off the return.
The setting is called Arrives as Waste and it has three states: blank, Yes and No. Blank means nobody has said, and anything blank is treated as waste. Only an explicit No ever keeps an item off the return. Every item already in your system is blank, so nothing about your return changes until you set this yourself.
There are three places to set it. Where more than one of them has an answer, the most specific wins:
- On the contract, on its Asset Type Settings tab. The "Arrives as Waste" column on the row for one Asset Type. This beats both of the defaults below. Use it where a client sends you one kind of thing as waste and everything else as assets, or the other way round. A contract can hold only one row per Asset Type.
- On the Asset Type, on its Processing Details tab. The box is called "Default for Items & Lots", under the "Arrives as Waste" heading, directly below Default Intended Final Action. Use it for a kind of equipment that arrives the same way whoever sends it.
- On the contract itself. "Default Arrives as Waste", under the Item Processing heading. Use it for a client whose deliveries are all one or all the other.
Note the order: an answer on the Asset Type beats the contract's own overall default. So if you set a client's contract to No and later set one of your Asset Types to Yes, that Asset Type wins and those items go back on the return. The Excluded tab below is where you would spot it.
The answer is worked out once, when the item is booked in, and stored on that item. Editing an Asset Type or a contract later does not go back and change items that are already in. That is deliberate: a return you have already sent to Defra must never quietly change its mind.
You can see what any item was given on the item itself, under the Processing Overview heading, with a line beneath it saying which setting the answer came from. Everyone can see it. Only an administrator can change it, because it is a legal judgement about your return rather than a working preference. If an item was recorded wrongly, an administrator ticks the items in an Items & Lots list, opens the Action menu above the list and chooses Change Arrives as Waste. Correcting an item does not amend a return already submitted to Defra, and the screen says so before you confirm.
On the DWT Export screen, the Excluded tab lists every item left off that day's return because it was recorded as not arriving as waste, one row per item, with its weight and a Decided By column naming the setting that made the decision. Items Excluded at the top of the screen counts them. Check that tab whenever a load you expected is not on the Received Loads tab. Anything missing from the return for some other reason will not be on it.
The hazardous waste consignment note follows the same setting: an item recorded as not arriving as waste is left out of Part E, the receipt section. That happens whether or not you report to Defra, because whether material was waste on arrival is a fact about the material rather than about reporting.
Arrives as Waste is not the Intended Final Action
These are two different questions and it matters that you keep them apart.
Arrives as Waste is whether the material was waste at the moment it arrived. That is what Defra ask about, and it is fixed by what happened on the day.
Intended Final Action is what you expect to do with the item eventually. It moves after arrival for ordinary commercial reasons, and that is fine.
They come apart in both directions:
- A skip of dead laptops arrives as waste, and twenty of them turn out to be worth reselling. Their final action becomes Resell, but the arrival was still a waste movement, so they stay on the return.
- A courier delivery of working laptops arrives as an asset transfer, and three of them fail testing and are recycled. Their final action becomes Recycle, but the arrival was never a waste movement, so they stay off the return.
Getting it wrong misreports in either direction. Waste that is later resold would wrongly drop off your return, and assets that are later recycled would wrongly appear on it. So set Arrives as Waste on what actually arrived, and leave it blank anywhere you are not sure.
If information is missing
If anything Defra require is still missing, you are asked to confirm before the file is built. You can still generate it: those cells are left blank for you to complete in Defra's spreadsheet before you upload. RecyclyERP never guesses a value on a legal return.
The message is grouped by load, then by waste code within that load, so you can see at a glance which records need attention.
The common ones and where to fix them:
- Carrier, Carrier registration number, Vehicle registration - open the collection and complete its transport details. A courier needs a waste carrier licence number on their contact record.
- Number of containers, container type - the inbound order's Expected Packages, and the Defra Container Type on that package type.
- Item Processing Action has no Defra disposal or recovery code - set the code once on the action and every future export uses it.
- Weight missing or zero - weigh the items on the load.
- Hazardous EWC code has no HP codes - set the Default HP Codes on that EWC code.
- Hazardous load has no consignment code - the collection address needs its hazardous premises code.
The daily reminder
When a day's loads have not been reported, a reminder appears on the main apps menu. It becomes more urgent from the day after the loads were received, and names the day your deadline falls on.
You can put it off for two hours or until tomorrow morning. There is deliberately no longer option: Defra's deadline is two working days, so a longer delay could push you past a legal deadline.
Each person can turn the reminder off for themselves in My Profile > Preferences, and an administrator can set it for any user under Users & Settings > User Details > Preferences tab.
Checking past days
The View All Exports button lists every date you have exported, with its status and, where submitted, who marked it so and when. It is your record of having reported.
Use it to spot an unfinished day. "Generated" means the file was built but nobody confirmed it was uploaded. "Draft" means the day was opened but never generated.
Checking the export still matches Defra's spreadsheet
Defra's spreadsheet is still in beta and they can revise it. The Check Defra Template button runs a set of checks on your own system and tells you in plain English whether the export still lines up with their file, whether a test load writes and reads back correctly, and whether the file opens cleanly. It changes nothing and reads no customer data.
Worth clicking whenever Defra announce a change to their template. If it reports a failure, send the result to the Recycly team.
Things worth knowing
- Nothing is ever sent to Defra automatically. You generate the file and you upload it.
- A day only counts as reported once someone clicks "Mark Day as Submitted to Defra". RecyclyERP cannot see Defra's service, so this reflects what your team has recorded, not what Defra have received.
- Loads received after a day was submitted are flagged, so you can report them on the next return.
- Weights are reported in kilograms. If your system works in pounds they are converted for you.
- Defra intend to replace the spreadsheet upload with a direct connection. The manual upload route is expected to remain available until at least October 2027, and automatic submission is planned before it is withdrawn.
Key dates
- 1 October 2026 - mandatory for permitted and licensed waste sites, including receiving sites.
- October 2027 - carriers, brokers, dealers and exempt sites join, and the spreadsheet upload route is expected to be withdrawn around this point.