KC Water’s online & phone payment systems are back. How to pay your bill & avoid fees
After an 11-day outage, Kansas City’s municipal water department announced Friday that its online and phone-based payment systems are back up and running.
However, payment records and water usage data may not be available in customers’ online accounts for another two months, according to a notice on the department’s website.
“Please note that some self-service functions are currently not available, such as water usage and meter read information,” the notice read. “Additionally, please allow up to two (2) billing cycles for your account to reflect any payments you have made.”
Kansas City’s website and many online services were rendered unusable Monday, May 6, by a system outage. While many city services returned after several days, a few saw lingering problems, including KC Water.
City officials have declined to say whether the outage was caused by a cyberattack, like the ones that have impacted Wichita and Jackson County in recent weeks.
Here’s what to know about the water department’s restored services.
Will I get late fees for failing to pay my water bill during the outage?
“All customers will have a grace period for payments due on or between May 4 and May 31,” the department wrote in a press release Friday morning.
That means water customers will not incur late fees on bills that are due before Saturday, June 1, according to Heather Frierson, Kansas City’s emergency communications manager.
“If someone is late on their bill that is due June 1st and going forward, that is when they will start getting late fees,” Frierson told The Star via email. “Any due dates between May 4th and 31st will not have late fees.”
She confirmed that customers with bills due during this time period will have an extra 30 days to make their payments before late fees take effect.
Will my water bill auto-payments from during the outage still be processed?
Frierson said that online auto-payments for water bills will still be processed, even if those payments were scheduled for a day during the department’s online outage and did not go through.
That means customers shouldn’t have to log in to their water accounts to make those online payments manually.
Who has the option to pay their water bill by mail?
Every KC Water customer has the option of paying their water bill by mail, over the phone or in person at the water department’s headquarters near Swope Park in addition to using the online system.
“In person drop-off and mail options are still available, and paper bills will still be sent to all customers with a prepaid return envelope,” the press release stated.
Frierson told The Star that during the upcoming billing cycle, every customer in the city will be sent a paper bill with a prepaid return envelope — even those who usually make payments online.
“The pre-paid envelopes are going to every customer on their next billing cycle,” she said.
If you have questions about your water bill or how to pay, the department recommends calling 816-513-1313.
Do you have more questions about local utilities in the Kansas City area? Ask the Service Journalism team at kcq@kcstar.com.
This story was originally published May 17, 2024 at 12:50 PM.
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