Monrovia city manager updates on phone, utility billing malfunctions

The city of Monrovia is upgrading its phone lines and also continues to deal with a downed utility billing system, City Manager Dylan Feik said Tuesday.

“We’re still working thru some issues,” Feik told Monrovia Weekly, but the city was scheduled Wednesday “for a significant switchover” of copper to fiber optics for municipal phone lines. “We’re still waiting to perform the work for Police but if all goes well, we’ll be back up and running very soon, without dropping calls.”

In a statement last week, Feik said Monrovia’s network provider Frontier Communications will update the “antiquated phone system” that recently has caused all city facilities to experience “higher than normal instances of ‘dead air.'” External calls to city phone lines result in no sound being transmitted despite the call being connected.

“We have reported instances of this happening at City Hall, the Police Station, Public Works and even Community Center,” Feik said. “We anticipate the phone repairs to be completed within the next few weeks.”

Utility billing down

Monrovia’s utility billing software has been inoperative since March 17, and the city has been unable to generate bills or receive online payments.

“During a planned equipment upgrade, the city lost its financial system data which includes utility billing but also payroll, accounts payable and financial reporting,” Feik said in a statement.

City staff and contracted technologists have had to rebuild and restore the lost financial data systems. The first task was to recreate the payroll system to ensure employees would be paid on time, and now the priority is to restore the utility billing system.

“We’re still working thru utility billing issues and don’t have much updates at this time,” Feik told Monrovia Weekly. Because “some people just really want to pay and avoid getting behind,” the city is accepting payments but isn’t requiring it.

In Feik’s announcement last week, he said the city is

• not generating new utility bills at this time;
• not sending bills to any water customer;
• not are not applying late fees or penalties;
• not shutting off water; and
• not accepting online bill payments as the online bill pay system is unavailable.

Affirmative tasks city staffers are currently doing include reading water meters to collect accurate consumption data that will be used to prepare future utility bills and accepting payments for those desiring to pay at this time.

Payment options include:

• in-person at Monrovia City Hall, Monday to Thursday 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., Friday 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.;
• calling 800-272-9829 — select option 3 and use Jurisdiction Code 1573; and
• dropping noncash payments in the drop box at the entrance to City Hall.

Utility customers can also prepay bills.

“At this time, we cannot determine how much you owe,” Feik said in a statement. “However, your last bill could be a good estimate of that amount. If you wish, you can make a prepayment using that estimate, and we will apply it to your bill once the system is back up.”

Customers won’t get a big catch-up bill once the system starts operating again, separate monthly bills will be generated, and there won’t be any late fees or shut-offs, according to Feik.

The city manager added that the billing system was not hacked, and no customer information has been compromised.

Questions or concerns about the phone or utility billing issues should go to pio@ci.monrovia.ca.us. The utility billing customer service team is available at 626-932-5517.

More information on Municipal Utility Services is on the city’s website.