@catsnmi
By the sound of it… what you are paying is just the basic charge…
If your rubbish system uses the zapper to open the black-bag bin… your neighbours will be charged for each “opening” they make, over and above the basic number included in the annual basic charge.
The “old” system charged a % of the perceived value of the property… thus one person living in a large house would (doubtless) have paid more than a family of 16 in a small house… regardless of the amount of rubbish…
The new system is perceived as being fairer… as it does have a base charge which all must pay and then charges are added according to actual usage.
We pay about 90€ for which we are allowed 6 collections as a maison secondaire - however the collections are fortnightly so sod’s law kicks in and it’s almost never the week we visit (also it is on a Wednesday so not much use for a one week stay).
So we get typically 2, sometimes even a single collection for our 90€
It covers access to the déchetterie though - which we do use a fair bit so I’m not too bothered about paying it.
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Sadly, our new basic-charge is more than our “old” charge via the %… and we don’t use the black-sack… just the dechetterie…
So we are paying more for this new system than we did for the old… but that’s just the luck of the draw. Funds to pay for dechetterie/recycling and rubbish clearance have got to be found from somewhere… and our dechetteries are super.
Maybe I’m lucky but I don’t recall seeing any charge, unless it’s wrapped up in the property tax, let alone any restrictions on quantity.
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I suspect you’re still on the old system… the new one hasn’t hit all of France yet…
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Rubbish collection - or not - is still a mystery in Cussy. We heard they come on a particular day, but although we were around there was no sign of anyone. There are some large green bins placed strategically in the village, and our rubbish went into those.
Had a feeling that was the case. 
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our lot used to come on a particular day “odd” weeks… then they changed to “even” weeks… and then they changed the dratted day…
and now we are on zapper bins… which they supposedly empty as and when they fill up ??
Chaos reigns… still it gives us something to talk about… from a safe distance of course…
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Makes me feel our arrangements quite good - weekly rubbish collections July and August, alternate weeks the rest of the year with recycling every 2 weeks throughout. The yearly timetable is downloadable from the Questembert web site and, so far, unfettered access to the déchetterie.
There’s a thing with magnetic openings but I’ve never bothered finding out how it works, we pass a site designed for camping car users to drop rubbish off on the way home so use that for anything not collected, or go to the déchetterie.
On your taxe fonciere if you have an item marked TEOM then you pay through your taxe fonciere.
If not then you will get billed by the ‘rubbish’ company, which may be the correct description!
Here in (most) of 24, our company is SMD3, and they are very unresponsive to any questions, remarks, or even complaints. A local (French) group is campaining against them: http://www.mecontents-collecte-dechets-dordogne.com/ and/or Redirecting...
Also in 24! Will be checking out that group!
Some years ago, I attended an Official Meeting with “big wigs”… where SMD3 (or whatever they were called at that time) assured us that folk would be charged according to how much or how little they threw away “into the hole in the ground”…
I pressed the point… and was assured that if I didn’t have rubbish to go into the ground aka black sack… then I wouldn’t be charged anything … and if I did have a black sack, it would be weighed and I would be charged per kilo/according… AND… they promised that their system would be cheaper than I was paying at that time…
Sorry if I sound miffed and, thinking it through… it’s clear they have to find money from somewhere… so I should pay something… but I do feel I’ve been swindled somewhat as it’s much more expensive than what I paid through the old system… and I’ve carefully reorganized my buying etc to eliminate the black sack… (which is good for the environment… so I should feel good… aaargh)
Having been involved with the campaign group, and also had contacts with SMD3 I can tell you they are economical with the truth!
They have taken away all the bins from public picnic areas, hoping that users will take their rubbish home with them.
They also charge tourists 4.50€ for a card to open the ‘black’ rubbish bins, but it only allows one opening!
As you might imagine there is a lot of black bags left next to the bins! It is all year round, but the summer is even worse.
Luckily our village still has bins at the park, pool ect but yes summer is a nightmare. I’d like them to have free access in July and August for sanitary reasons, for both tourists and us!
Well, it had to happen I suppose.
We used to have what I thought was agood service (see above).
Just got a letter through having got home to the UK - annual fee is going up to to €175, for which we get 12 collections like it or not (no reductions for maisons secondaires), and visits to the déchetèrie will be limited to 15 per year - 10€ a time after that 
In a single leap it’s gone from a service I didn’t mind paying for, even though we barely used it, to one which I am now going to resent (even more so because there’s no choice other than to cough up).
So 27 collections/deposits means €6.50 a time. Ok you don’t use them all, but strikes me as quite good value for clearing your rubbish. And incidentally for keeping your street clean too.
Sure, if you use every “included” collection and trip to the déchetèrie, however we don’t, except for one visit where we basically transferred all of the composted grass cuttings which we couldn’t spread on the garden to the tip - rather more than 15 visits that week!!
TBH that could do with a repeat but there’s no way my back would withstand continually forking compost into the trailer and out again at the other end several x per day.
If we do one run to the déchetèrie at the end of each stay (for some reason we always seem to choose the weeks when the rubbish isn’t collected) we’ll get about 5 visits for our 175€ - 35€ a visit is a bit on the steep side.
But, as I said, not much point grumbling, the writing was on the wall anyway given what was happening elsewhere in France.
I take it the grass is quite long when you cut it, I haven’t collected grass for 5 years now as it just gets mulched back into the grass as I cut it, we had adders eggs and young one year in the mulch heap so stopped collecting grass and doing one due to having the nine cats and a stupid dog.
We had weekly pick up of yellow sacs and bins. We paid 125€/year. 1 truck driving around the village once a week. We now have the stupid new system where we pay 270/year for 26 openings, fine in winter but 2 weeks of rubbish in summer is revolting 
. Also having to put rubbish in the car, most people don’t live close enough to walk so hundreds of trips rather than the one truck. Can’t see how that is better for the environment. Also our bins are SO ugly. And you are supposed to take each piece out and put in individually for the recycling