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Guidance on how to stay safe in an emergency - including power cuts and severe weather
There may be incidents where you are asked to evacuate your home. Please cooperate with the emergency services who are evacuating you, as they are doing this for your own safety.
You may wish to stay with friends and family as it is likely to be more comfortable – if you do, please let the emergency services or the Council know how to contact you when you are able to return to your home.
The Council is able to open up an emergency centre to accommodate people who have been displaced by an emergency - this is likely to be a public building and will be a place of safety and a source of information for the duration of the emergency. While every effort will be made to ensure that you are comfortable and your needs are catered for, it will be communal and may be crowded depending on how many people have been evacuated.
You can also check to see whether your Home Insurance covers temporary accommodation. If your property is managed by a housing association/ private agent, ultimately they are responsible for providing you with temporary accommodation.
Power cuts can happen for a variety of reasons, including severe weather. There are certain things you can do to stay safe if your electricity goes off:
We will try and keep to scheduled collections where it is safe to do so, but the severe weather have made many collections difficult. we update a map of known missed streets daily.
If your bin hasn’t been collected, please leave it out and it will be picked up as soon as it is safe to do so. If your recycling box/recycling box lid/ food caddy/ refuse bin has gone missing in the snow, you can order a new one online (or by calling 020 8726 6200).
You can find information about how to clear snow from a road, path or cycleway here (the snow code) on the Met Office website.
If you are a Council tenant, due to the severe weather conditions, there is exceptional demand on the repairs service. Many of the issues relate to frozen condense pipes, you can find advice and help on our housing repairs pages.
You can find information on gritting (including our routes and locations of grit bins) here.
Libraries may have shorter opening hours - please call before visiting and you can also find more information here. You will not be expected to pay fines on overdue items if a library has had to close due to snow. If the library is open but you cannot get to it due to snow, you can renew your library books online. You can also ring the library to renew or visit another Croydon library to return your books if it is easier for you.
If there is snow on the ground and road markings cannot be seen then no penalty charge notice (PCN) would be issued. If your vehicle is issued a PCN whilst there is snow, you have the right to appeal. If you can’t get to Access Croydon to renew your parking permit, you can now renew or apply for a parking permit online at parking permits services.
For the latest information on all schools in the borough, please check your school's social media accounts, visit the OpenCheck website, or contact the school directly. OpenCheck is provided through the London Grid for Learning and is updated by schools themselves.
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