Digital Waste Tracking: spreadsheet or API, and what carriers need by October 2027

Direct answer

Digital Waste Tracking is becoming mandatory in stages. Permitted and licensed receiving sites in England and Wales have had to report since 1 October 2026, and carriers, brokers and dealers are planned for October 2027. Sites can report through Defra's spreadsheet template or through an API linked to their waste software, and can mix the two.

Sites in Northern Ireland and Scotland follow in January 2027, and the service opens to carriers, brokers and dealers in spring 2027. The Welsh Government expects the temporary spreadsheet route to stay until October 2027.

If you receive a handful of loads a week, the spreadsheet will do for now. If you run a weighbridge, take dozens of loads a day or operate more than one site, connect your software to the API. Each record is due within two working days, and the spreadsheet means typing every load twice.

This guide is not legal advice. We build the record-keeping and the integration. The GOV.UK reporting guidance, the Environment Agency or your trade body confirms what you must report.

Who reports, from when

The dates below come from official pages we read on 24 October 2026. Phase 1 covers sites that receive waste. Phase 2 covers the businesses that move it.

A few details from the same pages change the day-to-day work:

• Each load must be submitted within two working days, counting from the day after it arrives. Weekends and bank holidays don't count.
• Waste transfer notes, hazardous waste consignment notes and waste returns carry on "until further notice". Digital tracking adds a record; it doesn't replace the paperwork yet.
• Household waste recycling centres in Wales are out of scope, and so are English ones that take household waste from residents. A digitally excluded operator can apply for an exemption on grounds of age, disability, location or religious belief. Preferring paper doesn't qualify.
• The first annual service charge of £26 per organisation is due by 31 January 2027, according to GOV.UK.
• Penalties range from compliance notices and a fixed £1,000 penalty to unlimited variable penalties and prosecution.

Spreadsheet or API: what each route involves

Both routes send the same data: the waste movement, carrier and receiver details, waste classification codes, recovery or disposal codes, and extra fields for persistent organic pollutants and hazardous waste. Where you can't supply a field, you have to say why.

The spreadsheet route. You download Defra's template, fill in the mandatory fields and upload it. You can't use your own spreadsheet or change Defra's format, and each submission needs a fresh copy of the template. For a small site this is fine. The cost is in the copying: every load already exists in your weighbridge, booking or invoicing software, and the template asks someone to type it in again inside two working days. Holidays, sickness and a busy Friday are where submissions start to slip.

The API route. Once you register your organisation you get a unique API code. You give it to your software provider, and their software sends each receipt to the service as part of the normal ticket. One code covers all your sites. GOV.UK publishes a list of compatible software providers, and Defra publishes developer guidance for anyone building the link.

Using both. GOV.UK says you don't have to choose: a site can send some loads through the API and some through the spreadsheet. That helps during a switch-over, or when one site is on newer software than another.

How long the spreadsheet lasts. The Welsh Government describes it as temporary, expected to remain until October 2027, with the API as the main route after that. Plan as if the spreadsheet is a bridge, not the long-term answer.

A simple way to decide:

Connecting a weighbridge or booking system to the API

This example is illustrative, not a client project. It assumes a site with a weighbridge system that records each ticket, a separate booking system for skip and haulage jobs, and accounts software for invoices. The weighbridge supplier isn't on the compatible list, so the site needs its own link.

1. Map the fields. List every field the service asks for and find where it already lives. Weights and dates usually sit on the weighbridge ticket. Carrier details often sit in the booking system. Waste codes might be on the ticket, on the customer account, or in someone's head. Every gap becomes a decision: add the field to the ticket, look it up from the customer record, or ask the operator at the gate.
2. Choose the trigger. The cleanest point is when a ticket is closed. A small service reads closed tickets, joins the carrier details from the booking system and builds one record per load.
3. Validate before sending. Rules check the record first: a waste code in the right format, a weight inside a sensible range, no missing carrier. Anything that fails goes to an exception queue with the reason, not to the regulator.
4. Send with the organisation's API code. The record goes to the service. The response is stored against the ticket, so anyone can see which loads were accepted and which were rejected.
5. Handle errors inside the deadline. GOV.UK says error notifications must be fixed within the same two working days. The exception queue shows the load, the error and the time left, and a named person clears it.
6. Reconcile daily. A short report compares tickets closed against records accepted, per site. If the numbers differ, someone sees it the same day.
7. Keep a fallback. If the service is down, GOV.UK asks you to keep a written record within two working days and transfer it within seven working days of the outage ending. The link can write that record automatically and replay it later.

Rules do this work, not AI. The one place a bounded AI step can help is reading free-text descriptions on older tickets to suggest a waste code, and even then a person confirms the code before anything is sent.

Records to keep and who checks them

The regulator for the site checks compliance: the Environment Agency in England and Natural Resources Wales in Wales. GOV.UK lists DAERA and SEPA as the contacts for Northern Ireland and Scotland.

What to keep, wherever the records live:

• The submission for every load, with the date sent and the service's response.
• The underlying ticket or note, since transfer notes and consignment notes still apply.
• Every error notification and the correction, with dates. Errors you find yourself generally have to be corrected within one month of finding them.
• Outage records, if the service was unavailable.
• For digitally excluded operators, written records kept for at least three years, each carrying the number the regulator issued.
• A note of who is responsible for submissions, and who covers when they're away.

If those sit in your existing weighbridge or booking software, keep them there. If they are scattered across email, paper and a spreadsheet, a small records app that holds the ticket, the submission and the correction together is often cheaper than chasing them at inspection time.

What to do before the spring 2027 beta

If you are a carrier, broker or dealer, the service is planned to open to you in spring 2027, with mandatory use planned for October 2027. DAERA calls the October date "planned", so watch for changes. A sensible order:

1. List where your movement data lives today: paper notes, a booking app, a spreadsheet, the accounts system.
2. Ask your software supplier whether they will support the phase 2 API, and when.
3. If they won't, or if you run on spreadsheets, decide whether to move to software on the GOV.UK list or to build a link from what you have.
4. Join the public testing when it opens, with real (but non-sensitive) loads.
5. Write down who submits, who checks the daily reconciliation, and who covers holidays.

If you run a receiving site and you're on the spreadsheet today, use the months before October 2027 to move to the API while the spreadsheet still works as a fallback.

Limitations

Dates and requirements were checked on GOV.UK, the Welsh Government, the Environment Agency blog and DAERA on 24 October 2026. Phase 2 dates are planned, not final, and Scottish arrangements may change as regulations are made. Check the official pages before you rely on a date. The worked example is illustrative.

Related AutomateFlow pages

• Records apps and reporting built around your systems
• Integrations between the tools you already use
• Connecting spreadsheets to a CRM or ERP
• Employment Rights Act holiday and absence records
• What AI implementation costs in the UK
• Book a call