After a bit of renovation on the house we had a pile of stuff to remove which would have meant multiple trips to the tip, time, effort etc. so we decided to do a one-off by getting a skip.

Ours was a 4 cubic metre flat type - which they leave on the road outside your place and then the truck comes back with a hook device and picks it up. One of the ones with a back door which you can wheel dirt into.

So a weekend was spent loading this thing - great to see it all stacking up. When you first get it, you think ... "wow so much room, I got one that's too big" but when you start piling it all in you regret not getting the bigger size. But for this job the 4m was fine. They have 4,6,8,10 and 20m sizes.

It was delivered on the Friday and picked up on the Monday - took a bit of room up outside and the neighbours had to be careful where they parked their cars, but then again, they park them too much on our side of the road anyway.

A blinking yellow light comes on at night time to warn of the bin's presence, since it sticks out a little more than the normal width of a car.

We found this type better than one we'd had before which was your more wedge shaped deep type where everything had to be lifted over the side. With this one, you wheelbarrow the heaviest stuff in - a couple of planks of wood do as a ramp - and then pack everything else on top.

Make sure you put the heavy stuff and then other stuff and then some more heavy stuff like old furniture or something on top because with rubbish bags etc they can take up a lot of room with wasted space in between if you've got nothing to compact them down with. Use all the space you can. We had tin and old carpet to go on top, so this was perfect. Still had some things we couldn't quite squeak in, but it was great to get it all gone.

Trips to the tip are getting so expensive for a small load, that even though the initial bin cost seems high, I think it's worth it for the one job, one effort and time saved.

Driver was on time and we let him know there would be a mattress in there and he said it was okay even though they say there is an extra charge for that. You cannot put hazardous materials in them - there are other companies if you need this sort of stuff removed. But for general rubbish, building debris, unwanted appliances and just junk, these guys were very satisfactory.

Approximate cost: $ Between $180 and around $300 depending on what you get.