The Scottish regulations say software must be approved. Approved by whom?

By the Scottish Ministers, who run the system under regulation 3 of the Digital Waste Tracking (Scotland) Regulations 2026. The system they run is the shared UK service, and the approval GOV.UK describes is the same for every nation: software must be "integrated with the receipt of waste service API" and have "passed the production approval tests", fourteen scenarios.

Does the same apply in Northern Ireland?

DAERA and NetRegs both point Northern Irish operators to the same Defra service and the same two ways of reporting. Northern Ireland’s regulations are not yet published, so the legal wording is not known. Nothing we found points to a separate system.

Can I use the spreadsheet instead of software in Scotland?

Yes, for now. SEPA lists Defra’s report receipt of waste spreadsheet as the second way, and says "This method of reporting will be kept under review, and may be phased out in the future." NetRegs calls it "a temporary solution".

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13 October 2026

There is no Scottish list. SEPA sends you to the same Defra service and the same approved software.

Q: Is there a separate list of approved digital waste tracking software for Scotland?

We could not find one, and SEPA does not point to one. SEPA tells Scottish operators to register on Defra’s service and says "your software provider can use an application program interface (API) to automatically upload information from your system directly into the digital waste tracking system". The GOV.UK list of software providers names Scotland and Northern Ireland on its own page: "In Northern Ireland and Scotland this comes into effect on 1 January 2027."

Tuesday 13 October 2026. After this morning’s piece on Scotland and Northern Ireland, the question came back within the hour. Will a yard in Scotland have to use software approved by Scotland, sending to a Scottish system? We went looking for the Scottish list. There is not one.

Where the question comes from

It is a fair question, because the Scottish law asks it. The Digital Waste Tracking (Scotland) Regulations 2026 say a digital waste record is one "created using software that has been approved by the designated person", and the designated person is the Scottish Ministers. They "must establish, maintain and operate an electronic system", and its functions "include (but are not limited to) the approval of software". Read on its own, that sounds like a second system and a second approval.

What SEPA actually tells you to do

SEPA sends Scottish yards to Defra. "You will first need to register to use the service (Defra’s guidance on gov.uk)." Then "your software provider can use an application program interface (API) to automatically upload information from your system directly into the digital waste tracking system". For help with the service it gives Defra’s helpline. There is no SEPA list of software and no SEPA approval step.

The approval is on the GOV.UK list, and that page names you itself: "In Northern Ireland and Scotland this comes into effect on 1 January 2027." Software gets on it by being "integrated with the receipt of waste service API" and having "passed the production approval tests", fourteen scenarios, once, for the whole service. The system the Scottish Ministers run is the shared one. The approval is the one already done.

Scotland and Northern Ireland, side by side. The two marked rows answer the question.
	Scotland	Northern Ireland
Which service do you report to?	Defra’s report receipt of waste service	The same, says NetRegs
Which software can you use?	Anything on the GOV.UK list, which names Scotland	The same list, which names Northern Ireland
Who do you ask about the rules?	SEPA	DAERA
Who do you ring about the service?	Defra’s helpline, 03000 203 781	The same
Are the regulations published?	Yes, in force 1 January 2027	Not yet

Northern Ireland

Without published regulations we cannot quote the law. What we can quote points the same way. DAERA links to GOV.UK’s page on the service, and NetRegs, which SEPA and DAERA run together, tells both nations the same thing: register for the report receipt of waste service, pay the £26, send by software or by spreadsheet. Nothing we found points to a separate system.

One thing that differs: the spreadsheet

SEPA lists Defra’s spreadsheet as the second way to report, and adds that it "will be kept under review, and may be phased out in the future". NetRegs calls it "a temporary solution". GOV.UK no longer says either. If you plan to start on the spreadsheet, plan to move off it.

What BreakerHQ does

BreakerHQ is on the GOV.UK list that names Scotland and Northern Ireland, and it sends to the same Defra service SEPA sends you to. Nothing to install and no training. A Scottish yard can sign in today, while the service is "open for voluntary use", and have a few weeks of real receipts behind it before 1 January. The honest gaps from this morning’s piece still stand: some screens quote England’s regulation numbers, the carrier check reads England’s register, and the transfer note is built on the England and Wales rules.

We went looking for the Scottish list. The Scottish regulator sent us to the one we were already on.