Outraged by poor service from Sita, one resident dumped her uncollected rubbish outside the council offices.

The radical action is the latest in a catalogue of complaints levelled at the firm of contractors which has already been fined by Brighton and Hove Council for failing to provide an efficient service.

Penalty clauses in the firm's £6.7 million-a-year contract have been invoked and the council's legal department is in discussions with Sita over the amount of the fines.

This has not been enough to satisfy Claire Forrest, of Woodland Avenue, Hove, who claims the firm fails to collect her bin bags at least twice a month.

She said the last straw came when the contractors did not collect her rubbish again on Tuesday.

She made numerous telephone calls to the council to try to get the rubbish collected before deciding she would take matters into her own hands.

She marched to the Brighton and Hove Council offices at King's House in Grand Avenue, Hove, with her daughters Abigail, 16, and Eleanor, 12, and tipped out the rubbish in the doorway.

She said she directed her protest at the council because it is responsible for employing High Wycombe-based Sita under contract but said she never had any problems before the firm took over responsibility for refuse.

She said: "It was a last resort. The security guard just said 'it won't do you any good'. I decided to pick it up because in the past people have done this and left it there but they've then been prosecuted.

"I dropped it all out on the steps but people were just walking by ignoring me as though nothing was happening. I guess it must happen a lot.

"I rang up and said 'I want it collecting or I'm going to the call The Argus'."

Mrs Forrest said she leaves her rubbish behind the gate at the edge of her driveway, rather than leaving it out on the street. She claims it is sometimes collected but says collection crews often leave it if she does not put the bin bags out on the kerb.

"It's been in the same place for the last 19 years so they should really know where it is by now.

"To be fair to the council officers, they are always sympathetic but I don't want sympathy, I want action. You do end up dealing with faceless people and nothing seems to get done."

Her daughter Abigail said: "There was fish in there that had started to smell. It was worse in the summer."

Sita has already admitted it has failed residents and that the situation has developed into a "nightmare".

Regional director Paul Taylor has promised to plan ahead for the future, including introducing wheelie bins in Brighton. He has promised to improve the firm's system of rubbish collection.

A spokesman for the council said Mrs Forrest's problems were the result of Sita's re-organisation of its system in July when the firm split the 126,000 properties in Brighton and Hove into three different areas.

He said: "What used to happen is that her refuse was being collected by a crew from Hove. Now it's collected by people from Brighton. It is likely to be this that has caused the hit-and-miss nature of her service.

"She is supposed to get what is called a back-door collection so she should be able to leave it where she has always left it.

"We will be pursuing that with Sita to ensure she gets the service she is entitled to."

Mrs Forrest's rubbish has now been collected.