What to do with items no wanted

youth_leader

I sold during lockdown, and was putting everything I couldn't take by my bins in my large horseshoe drive, it was gone by the next morning. One couple that took my large tin trunk turned up at my rental with a rather delicious lemon cake as a thank you.

Mickey666

lookstraightahead said:

I'm worried about giving electrical items away as they are not pat tested 😂

Many charity shops will take such items because they PAT test them before sale.

I don't believe that PAT testing is required for a private sale, but happy to be corrected on that if anyone has a reference to back it up.

In fact, I'm pretty sure there is no law that specifies PAT testing as such.  What there is are various laws and regulations - mostly to do with safety at work etc, ie in commercial and business situations - that require electrical equipment used or supplied for commercial purposes to be safe and it it generally accepted that PAT testing is one method for achieving compliance to the regulations.
https://www.pat.org.uk/is-pat-testing-a-legal-requirement/

Falafels

Mickey666 said:

I don't believe that PAT testing is required for a private sale, but happy to be corrected on that if anyone has a reference to back it up.

When I was moving out, I was discussing what was going with the removals men. I said not to take the microwave - which still worked but was rather rusty and battered - because I was going to dump it. One of the guys asked if he could have it; no problem.

I even gave it an extra clean for him.

badger09

deannagone said:

badger09 said:

British Heart Foundation will collect almost everything you don't want. Only exception I'm aware of are mattresses and chairs/sofa with no fire label. If you phone them, they'll tell you what day they collect from your area & arrange collection to suit you, or you can book online. We got them to collect several lots of furniture, crockery, linens, clothes etc before our recent move as I CBA trying to sell it all bit by bit.
https://www.bhf.org.uk/shop/donating-goods/book-furniture-collection-near-me

They don't, they are fairly picky, I had a very nice carved sideboard (two piece, real wood), they came round to look at it and rejected it because there were two tiny wear marks on it.  Said people wouldn't want it.

That's different to my recent experience with BHF. They took several matching pieces of mahogany furniture which was over 25 years old, but not worn or damaged at all. They also took a set of cherry wood dining furniture, over 20 years old, with a couple of dents in the base of the display unit. When they collected the dining set a week later, they said the mahogany had already sold.

TBagpuss

It perhaps depends on location - I would expect them to know their local market!
Definitely worth calling them, however. 
Near me, there is an organization which will collect white goods - they refurbish them and then they are provided to people who have fled domestic abuse and are moving on from the local refuge into homes of their own. They will take items which aren't working as they either fix them or use them for parts (and presumably then sell anything left as scrap!) You could google to see if there is anything similar near you