Lincoln City Clerk:
New billing format for city sewer and trash may cause confusion
If you have questions, please call

[June 05, 2018] 

LINCOLN 

At the Monday evening meeting of the Lincoln City Council, City Clerk Peggy Bateman spoke about some confusion that is happening with the new format of the city billing property owners for both city sewer and garbage services. The problem is occurring particularly with those who have pre-paid their sewer bills and have credit balances.

Bateman said that the software was supposed to separate the sewer credit balance from the current month’s trash bill on the one page statement mailed out by the city. However, it does not.

As it stands, it appears that both the sewer fee and the garbage fee have been deducted from the total credit balance, and that there is nothing due. However, Bateman said that was not the case because legally, the city cannot use dollars paid for the sewer to pay for the trash, so the bottom line is, property owners need to pay the amount specified as their trash bill, regardless of the credit balance showing at the bottom of the statement.

On the statements mailed out late last week, arriving in mailboxes on Monday, the trash portion of the bill is highlighted, and that amount should be paid on or before June 20th.

Bateman said that starting early Monday afternoon, the city clerk’s office was inundated with phone calls, and that many folks didn’t get through. She said that those who left messages did receive call backs, and questions were answered as quickly as possible.

She said that staff had stayed after regular business hours to make sure that all the calls were returned.

Her advice to the community is that if the statement appears confusing, please call her office and she and her staff will walk through the process with the customer and help them understand what needs to be done regarding payment.

Aldermen Tracy Welch added that the city wants to hear about these issues and wants citizens to feel free to contact the city regarding questions, but he asked that everyone ‘please be nice.” He said the city made this decision to combine the two bills and that like any other change, it is going to take time to work it all out. He said the city staff is doing a great job, and he is hopeful that the public will be patient with the clerk’s office and the city.

This was the primary reason for doing away with the pre-payment plan in the city sewerage department a few months ago. City leaders anticipated that the credit balances would be very difficult to track with the combined billing and would be difficult for property owners as well. Therefore, anyone who has a credit balance, may experience this confusion until their credit is spent, but in the years ahead, there will be no such issues.

Welch also noted that the sewer rate did not go up, it is still $24 per month, and that the city has made no decision on when to make the rate increase.

Bateman also noted that there are Area Disposal customers who have credit balances on their trash services with that company. She said those credits will not be transferred to the city, and that Area has said they will issue refunds to anyone with a credit balance. She suggested that if property owners do not receive those refunds they should contact Area directly.

Additionally, she said that Area Disposal provided the city with a spreadsheet reflecting what monthly charges should be at each address. She said if someone was entitled to a senior discount and did not get it in this month’s bill, it is because it was not reflected on the spreadsheet.

To get that issue corrected, please contact the city clerk’s office.

Finally, every customer in Lincoln will now have a new account number. For those who make auto-pay online payments, it is important that they change the account number on their payment order.

Anyone who has any concerns or questions about the combined sewer and trash billing program may contact the city clerk at 217-735-2815 or contact your alderman.

[Nila Smith]