Binly is a Birmingham-built behaviour-change app that tells residents which bin to use, rewards them for getting it right, and gives the council per-bin contamination evidence that current MRF sampling can't produce — funded by what the council currently loses on rejected loads.
Any one of these unlocks the next stage. All three is the strongest start.
| Council pain today | What Binly changes |
|---|---|
| Contamination only visible at MRF, weeks late | Per-bin, per-day scan ledger — flags before the lorry arrives |
| Education campaigns are ward-blanket | Per-ward "top offender" item list — target leaflets where they matter |
| Defra reform 2025–27 needs behaviour change but funds infrastructure only | Free-to-resident behaviour layer; council pays only from saved rejection cost |
| £80–140/tonne paid to dispose of rejected loads | Reduction in rejections is the budget that pays for the scheme |
| KPI | Baseline | 90-day target | Stretch |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ward sign-ups | 0 | 200 households | 500 |
| Active weekly users | — | 120 (60% of signups) | 300 |
| Scans per active user / week | — | 15 | 30 |
| Recycling rate (MRF, Lozells) | 20.3% | +3pp | +5pp |
| Contamination rate (MRF) | ~25% | -5pp | -10pp |
| Verified bin-QR sessions / week | 0 | 40% of active users | 70% |
All measurements published. Failure modes documented. Pilot ends in a report whether it worked or not.
| Risk | Our mitigation | What we need from you |
|---|---|---|
| Political "Council policing residents" | Framing: rewards earned, not punishments. No bin emptied differently. No reporting. Right to appeal at every tier. | Comms team review of the language we use |
| Data Linking ID to bin-level data | Council is data controller; Binly is processor under DPA. Pseudonymised dashboards. 30-day deletion. | Information Governance review of the DPA draft |
| Equity Non-smartphone residents | 92% UK adoption; pilot opt-in only. Non-app residents face no change. Future: paper-form route for non-digital households. | Acknowledge as known limitation, not blocker |
| Behavioural "Rewards schemes failed before" | Prior schemes verified at the lorry; we verify at point-of-decision + at the bin + at the MRF. Different chain. | Time to walk through §5 of the whitepaper if useful |
If we have a phone and a printed bin sticker we can show — in the meeting — a Bin Session, voice-announced bin recommendations, bin-QR verification, and the trust score climbing in real time. This is the integrity loop working end-to-end. See separate demo script.