Retired notebooks tend to pile up in drawers after staff leave or a refresh rolls out. WMG Waste eRecycling offers laptop recycling for businesses and individuals: we collect the devices, erase or destroy the storage in each one, resell the laptops that still have value and send the rest to WEEELABEX certified recycling. Every unit is logged by serial number.

Why do laptops need more care than a desktop PC?

Two parts make a laptop harder to dispose of than it looks.

The battery

Almost every laptop runs on a lithium-ion battery pack, often glued in place. When that pack is punctured, crushed or overheated it can catch fire, which is why laptops must never go into a household bin or a general waste container. WEEE rules require batteries to be removed from collected equipment before the rest is processed.

The storage

Laptops travel, so they hold more than office files: saved passwords, email caches, VPN settings and browser sessions. Many recent models use SSD storage, and some have it soldered to the motherboard. A quick format does not remove that data, and a soldered drive cannot simply be pulled out and shredded on its own.

How does WMG handle a batch of old laptops?

• You request a quote and we reply within 24 hours.
• We collect the laptops, for most standard corporate collections in the Netherlands at no charge, and hand you an itemized receipt.
• Each laptop is logged by serial number and tracked until final processing.
• Storage is wiped with NIST 800-88 compliant methods. Where a drive fails the wipe or cannot be wiped, it is physically destroyed, on-site or off-site.
• Laptops in good condition are refurbished and resold. The rest are recycled, with up to 95% of materials recovered.

Want to know more about the erasure step? Our page on NIST 800-88 data erasure explains how wiping keeps a device reusable.

Can your business get money back for used laptops?

Business laptops from the last few years usually have a second-hand market, especially when they come in larger batches with chargers. After erasure and refurbishment we resell them and return the proceeds to you. Check the details of our laptop buyback program to see what qualifies.

What proof do you get for each laptop?

You receive a certificate of data destruction for every device, listed by serial number, and a recycling report once processing is finished. That gives your IT and privacy teams a clear record for GDPR and WEEE audits, even for laptops that were lost track of for months in a cupboard.

Ready to clear out those old notebooks? Ask for a free quote and tell us how many you have.