UK users waste money by wasting mobiles

The UK is home to a nation of mobile phone hoarders who don’t realise that they could be making money out of old handsets, as well as doing their bit for the environment and developing countries.

Just under a quarter (23 per cent) of us simply throw our handsets away when we don’t want them anymore, 28 per cent hoard them and just one fifth bother to recycle them. But more than half (53 per cent) of us don’t even attempt to recycle old mobiles because of laziness or the fact that the act is perceived as too difficult.

So says research published today by mobile phone recycling advocate Fonebank, who took to the streets to survey more than 1,000 people about what they do with their handsets when they fall out of love with them.

More than a third (36 per cent) of respondents own two unused mobiles and 19 per cent admitted they had three or more unwanted handsets knocking around.

Almost everyone (93 per cent) said they would happily recycle their old phones in exchange for money, yet a massive gap still exists in turning this good intention from theory to reality.

“It’s so straight forward [to recycle your mobile]. But still, despite a number of companies doing what we do, many people in this country don’t know that they can also make money out of it,” said Olly Tagg, marketing director at Corporate Mobile Recycling, Fonebank’s parent company.

In addition to individuals looking to make some extra money as the economy bites, the IT departments of local councils, police forces and other companies are getting in on the act, according to Tagg.

“There’s a whole raft of companies [sending in their phones]. We’d like more companies to do this as they tend to have a greater volume of phones and they tend to be in better condition,” he said.

Tagg added that, while Fonebank goes to great lengths to remove information from phones sent to it, the company is re-launching its corporate website in January and plans to use this opportunity to provide more advice for businesses on how to quickly and easily wipe data from devices before sending them in for recycling.

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