FRACKVILLE - Residents will soon be able to pay their garbage bills with their credit cards.
During Wednesday's meeting, the borough council voted to enter a contract with ePaymentNow.com to provide credit card processing services to the borough for collecting the quarterly trash collection fees. Global Net Consulting, Winfield, is the parent company, which provides other electronic payment services.
The contract term is for one year, beginning July 1, after which the council can decide to discontinue the service or extend it another three years.
Councilman Bradley Gotshall introduced the idea for credit card payments several months ago and began looking into different options, including banks to provide the services. Gotshall said the Schuylkill County Office of the Treasurer, where he is employed, has used the payment service for about five years.
"The treasurer's office accepts credit card payments for delinquent taxes, dog and hunting licenses," Gotshall said after the meeting. "We (treasurer's office) collect a lot of money with ePaymentNow."
The company also provides services to 23 Pennsylvania counties along with Schuylkill County, and boroughs, townships, municipal authorities and others.
Residents will be able to use their VISA, MasterCard and Discover cards. There is no cost to the borough but each customer payment will have a 4 percent surcharge added.
"People will be able to pay with their credit cards at the borough office, at the website and by telephone," Gotshall said. "We'll have a link on our website (www.frackvillepa.org) to connect to ePaymentNow. All they'll have to do is put in their account number and the website will bring up what they owe."
When asked about accounts with delinquent balances, Gotshall said payments will apply to the delinquencies in a first-in, first-out basis.
When a payment is made in person or by telephone at the borough office, the customer's account will be credited the same way as a cash payment. Gotshall said when the payment is made online, ePaymentNow will send an email to the borough secretary with the payment information.
Gotshall said that, at the treasurer's office, some do not want to pay the surcharge for using a credit card, however, others prefer to bring their balances current with the county and then pay off their credit card instead.
"For a lot of people who are paying on delinquencies, they just want to get it over with," Gotshall said.
Gotshall said the credit card payments will just be for the trash collection billing but that could expand in the future if the system works well for the borough.
"If it is working properly, down the road we can add anything we want," he said. "We can add parking tickets, building permits and more. For right now, we're just going to stick with trash collection."