"John Rumm" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 21/11/2012 00:16, Wesley wrote:
I recently bought a new oven from Argos which is to be delivered on the
weekend and I paid about £8 for them to take away and recycle our old
cooker.

Tonight I noticed a wanted ad on our local Freecycle website for an
electric
cooker. I replied and they are collecting it tomorrow - for free.

It got me thinking.

What is the 'weigh in' price at the scrappers for old cookers, which are
very heavy and almost 100 per cent metal, and does this outweigh what
Argos
are charging me for recycling. If the 'weigh in' price is greater that
the
price I am paying to have the cooker recycled, then it would appear to be
a
nice little earner for Argos.

It also got me wondering if the ad on Freecycle was from a person who
genuinely needed an electric cooker or some pikeys collecting scrap
metal.

I recently weighed in 160kg of scrap steel and cast iron - worth about
£17.

So for ferrous stuff - pennies per kilo. Copper/brass on the other hand,
several quid a kilo.

Lets assume my cooker weighs about 100kg. Argos has to send their lorry to
my address (and lots of others) during the day and return empty. Why not
make up for this by loading up with scrap metal, charging the punters for
the service, and making more money from the scrap value?