Businesses in Gwent and across Wales are being offered a simple solution to reduce administration and costs of complying with waste management regulations - and Newport-based Eco-Oil is urging other businesses to consider making the switch.

Edoc – which stands for ‘electronic duty of care’ - is a new online system for businesses to record details of what happens to their waste.

It provides a quick and easy alternative to the use of outdated and cumbersome paper ‘waste transfer notes’ which most businesses must currently complete and save for at least two years to comply with the law.

It is expected that edoc could save an average business up to half the administrative cost of waste transfer recording, as well as cutting down on paper and storage costs. It will also provide a key tool for waste management businesses, who can use it to exchange waste transfer details with their customers online.

Barry Couzens, compliance manager, Eco-Oil Ltd said: “We want to make the switch because we feel it would be far more manageable than the current system. Even though we only produce between 100 and 150 WTNs per year difficulties arise when at times they are misplaced and collating data for auditing purposes can be a tedious process.

“As well as cutting out some of the minor charges associated with producing and collecting WTNs, edoc will allow us to produce more accurate figures about our waste production so we can be more accountable and demonstrate compliance with legislation. Edoc will just make my job so much easier.”

Chris Deed, edoc programme manager at the Environment Agency, said: “We estimate that UK businesses currently create some 23 million waste transfer notes every year. With the legal requirement to keep documentary evidence for at least two years, that’s potentially 50 million pieces of paper in storage somewhere across the country at any one time.

“We’re really encouraged by the response we’ve had to edoc so far. It’s not a mandatory system, but the level of interest shows that businesses want to use it. We believe edoc will become the default option for most companies, and has the potential to move 80 per cent of waste transfer records online over time.”