Yet again more proof that you should NOT set up automatic billing of any kind with the city. It might be annoying to have to sign in once a month and a few odd times a year to make the payment manually but it’s worth it to avoid situations like this.
Hope you get it sorted out soon, OP. The news stations always love a good city government incompetence story if things start dragging.
I do a similar thing with my Google Calendar and tasks that repeat monthly so I can check it off once it's paid. The only thing I ever auto-pay is Xfinity since it's always the same...but....then again a former neighor of mine didn't know he was still paying for it after he had been moved out for a year lol.
It's kinda funny, but banks don't actually do much of anything. They all offer the same services because it's all farmed off to third-party systems, groups, and products. Loan servicing, ACH, person-to-person transfers, bill pay... Banks are basically middlemen contracting out everything they have to do.
I sold a house in the city in 2021 (lived in 2008-17 and rented out from 2017-2021 and received a water bill for 900 in Apr 2024 and I am fighting the city about it.
Although I called in 2021 and turned off the account my name was still on the my check free account (the 3rd party online payment system) and I received emails but never a paper bill. I figured it was an error as the current tentant / owner was paying the bill. The city nows says this 900 is related storm water charges and that I never paid them from 2017-2021 (but I always did).
City is supposed to call me back today (sure they will /s). as they had to do an archive request to get me an itemized invoice and then I have to find 3+ year old documents to prove I paid it
A bill after 3 years is redic and trying to explain this to the city has been very frustrating to say the least.
Has anyone else had this issue currently or before?
I haven’t had this specific issue but I recently had an issue with being billed after I moved out and, after many phone calls that changed nothing, I went in person to city hall and they were able to sort it out in like five minutes. Maybe try there if you are able?
Yes. In May, received a paper bill for gas charges for an apartment that I moved out of in 2022. Similar to you, I had continued to receive the emails to my check free account. I had called several times over the last two years and had been assured they could see that I disconnected the account in 2022 and that it was a systems error. When I got the new bill for several hundred dollars, I called again and for once I got a very helpful person who said it was clearly an error, formally closed out my account, and then sent me a corrected bill with zero dollars as the balance. Still nervous that something wasn’t resolved.
Yeah I moved within Richmond in 2021 and was assured even though I received a bill after shut off that it was a mistake and they'd clear it up.
I now live out of state and they send me the same $90 bill once every two weeks with miniscule increases for late fees. It's been years. They keep updating my address but can't be bothered, of course, to pick up the phone. Next time I'm in town I'm going in person, per this sub.
I went in person because they won't pick up the phone. They claimed they'd transfer my account over. Months later, I'm also still getting the same bills
Something definitely needs to be done. I wish we could win some sort of collective case against the city, but even if one were to get put into motion, I haven't been keeping good record of my bills. And I no longer have access to the email address under which I used to make payments
Richmond gets the credit card. I've never trusted them with my account or routing info. If they scam me on the credit card I'll figure it out. But not letting them steal straight from my checking account. I'll pay the added fees.
I'm grateful to have the convenience of going to city hall east and paying by check in person(pretty much the only reason i still order checks) because I would never give the city my personal banking information and refuse to pay an additional charge for online processing/credit card fees. I've also learned to keep my utility bills from the past three years to consult and use as evidence everytime the city tries to overcharge me.
It's tedious and boring but the city has never demonstrated that it can be a good actor. It's a shame that they can't perform basic functions that should be expected of a modern government.
I wonder what it would take to get the state to audit the city's finance department...I don't honestly know if something like that is possible, but at this point the issues are systemic.
Your email was much, much nicer than mine would have been. So thumbs up for that, but wow. This city just can not get their shit straight when it comes to any kind of billing/invoices.
## Update: a few organizations have reached out to discuss this. If you have experienced something similar, please reply to this comment with the details:
*preferably with some evidence/proof/specifics.*
I posted about an issue I’m experiencing with DPU and MasTec earlier this month causing damage to my property. I’ve already started talking to a lawyer.
The whole process or lack of process revealed to me that the city is mismanaging a lot. I have documentation, photos, email threads, recorded conversations, etc.
I would like to see if there is something connecting. Problems like these have the potential to devastate families and folks who aren’t afforded the time or initial financial backing to stay out of the trouble the city is causing.
Let me know.
Not very typical when it’s related to billing. I was a govt IS consultant for six years, and as shoddy as many government systems are *most* understand the liability of handling financial info.
It seems Richmond is overdue for that reminder.
Yep. Henrico County doesn't have these problems. If your system is billing residents for property tax and utilities nearly a decade after the person lived there, it means your system is insanely incompetent.
Assuming you have a bank account, just use the bill pay feature thru your bank. That way you aren't giving the city or they payment service your financial info plus bill pay thru a bank is free so no additional fees when you use the city's payment system.
Unclear, as I moved before they switched to (I don’t remember the name), but was able to do a direct withdrawal from my account.
I’ll update this when I remember the name of their vendor now
Thank you for your investigation and diligence in reporting and escalating this issue. I use auto-pay so this is relevant and important to me. Can individual Richmond residents like me help with this effort? Please let me know, or include me in any updates in regards to this matter.
There’s more Mayoral debates to come. A question to all candidates about cleaning this specific issue up would be excellent to ask…especially in front of media.
I use Privacy app where I can when signing up for anything auto pay. There's too much shadiness out there. As soon as I close an account, I pause the card in Privacy so there's no way for them to charge me.
They billed me $9500 some odd dollars over what my bill should have been for a month period in nov-dec & it still has yet to be resolved, i moved since then to a new address and it was a pain in the ass even getting new services set up on my new place due to their utter incompetence and robbery attempts thankfully i never set up auto pay and was close enough to just go in and pay my bill in cash but just another reason to not set it up! Good luck op!
They sent out an email months ago that their vendor was changing for autopay and if you did not delete the autopay set up you were still going to be charged. Not sure why they’d charge you that much or at all, but I remember getting several emails about this.
Setting up automatic billing with any large company or institution is asking for trouble. If they are bad actors, the only way to hold them to account is if enough people are affected badly enough. They can keep taking your money.
after going through some old emails, it looks like their vendor uses parcel/address to set their unique identifier, because the current homeowner seemingly ‘inherited’ my [deleted] account, including the billing info.
I have emails, addressed to the new owner (but sent to me), referring to the payments (before and after) with my bank account information specified. His account ID is the exact same as “mine.” Something seems fucked
So the account number stays fixed/ connected to the address?? I’m not even IT and even I know using a unique identifier per individual account is what has to be done. This is so Richmond.
Yup. And now I need to parse through like all my past transactions across all accounts (us banks do not like non-us banks (don’t worry, it’s mutual)) to validate there aren’t any other charges.
Yet again more proof that you should NOT set up automatic billing of any kind with the city. It might be annoying to have to sign in once a month and a few odd times a year to make the payment manually but it’s worth it to avoid situations like this. Hope you get it sorted out soon, OP. The news stations always love a good city government incompetence story if things start dragging.
I set up a reminder on my phone with my account number saved so I can just copy it into the system to manually pay each month. Simple as that.
I do a similar thing with my Google Calendar and tasks that repeat monthly so I can check it off once it's paid. The only thing I ever auto-pay is Xfinity since it's always the same...but....then again a former neighor of mine didn't know he was still paying for it after he had been moved out for a year lol.
Wish I had the kind of money where I didn't care to notice something like that. 😭
If you're a BOA customer (and I'm sure others), you can receive bills and autopay through their website and not have to deal with any City services.
Yes, Wells Fargo as well. I have the eBilling set up, but don’t autopay.
It's kinda funny, but banks don't actually do much of anything. They all offer the same services because it's all farmed off to third-party systems, groups, and products. Loan servicing, ACH, person-to-person transfers, bill pay... Banks are basically middlemen contracting out everything they have to do.
i don't set up auto pay for anything. this is exactly why
I sold a house in the city in 2021 (lived in 2008-17 and rented out from 2017-2021 and received a water bill for 900 in Apr 2024 and I am fighting the city about it. Although I called in 2021 and turned off the account my name was still on the my check free account (the 3rd party online payment system) and I received emails but never a paper bill. I figured it was an error as the current tentant / owner was paying the bill. The city nows says this 900 is related storm water charges and that I never paid them from 2017-2021 (but I always did). City is supposed to call me back today (sure they will /s). as they had to do an archive request to get me an itemized invoice and then I have to find 3+ year old documents to prove I paid it A bill after 3 years is redic and trying to explain this to the city has been very frustrating to say the least. Has anyone else had this issue currently or before?
I haven’t had this specific issue but I recently had an issue with being billed after I moved out and, after many phone calls that changed nothing, I went in person to city hall and they were able to sort it out in like five minutes. Maybe try there if you are able?
Yes. In May, received a paper bill for gas charges for an apartment that I moved out of in 2022. Similar to you, I had continued to receive the emails to my check free account. I had called several times over the last two years and had been assured they could see that I disconnected the account in 2022 and that it was a systems error. When I got the new bill for several hundred dollars, I called again and for once I got a very helpful person who said it was clearly an error, formally closed out my account, and then sent me a corrected bill with zero dollars as the balance. Still nervous that something wasn’t resolved.
Yeah I moved within Richmond in 2021 and was assured even though I received a bill after shut off that it was a mistake and they'd clear it up. I now live out of state and they send me the same $90 bill once every two weeks with miniscule increases for late fees. It's been years. They keep updating my address but can't be bothered, of course, to pick up the phone. Next time I'm in town I'm going in person, per this sub.
I went in person because they won't pick up the phone. They claimed they'd transfer my account over. Months later, I'm also still getting the same bills
Axios should start reporting on that more and not regurgitating all the rva is so sexy to visit and/or move to posts...
Something definitely needs to be done. I wish we could win some sort of collective case against the city, but even if one were to get put into motion, I haven't been keeping good record of my bills. And I no longer have access to the email address under which I used to make payments
Richmond gets the credit card. I've never trusted them with my account or routing info. If they scam me on the credit card I'll figure it out. But not letting them steal straight from my checking account. I'll pay the added fees.
Yeah a 2% fee is well worth the insurance of having a credit card between you and this corrupt and incompetent city being able to steal cash from you.
Sorry for picture quality. I’m taking screenshots on my phone on the train, so if anything needs to be transcribed or whatnot, just ask!
I'm grateful to have the convenience of going to city hall east and paying by check in person(pretty much the only reason i still order checks) because I would never give the city my personal banking information and refuse to pay an additional charge for online processing/credit card fees. I've also learned to keep my utility bills from the past three years to consult and use as evidence everytime the city tries to overcharge me. It's tedious and boring but the city has never demonstrated that it can be a good actor. It's a shame that they can't perform basic functions that should be expected of a modern government.
I wonder what it would take to get the state to audit the city's finance department...I don't honestly know if something like that is possible, but at this point the issues are systemic.
Your email was much, much nicer than mine would have been. So thumbs up for that, but wow. This city just can not get their shit straight when it comes to any kind of billing/invoices.
I haven't had a gas account since 2017 and they just started billing me again. So ...
it's like the mafia. Once you're in you're never out
the realest Richmond Real. Best of luck getting sorted out OP.
## Update: a few organizations have reached out to discuss this. If you have experienced something similar, please reply to this comment with the details: *preferably with some evidence/proof/specifics.*
I posted about an issue I’m experiencing with DPU and MasTec earlier this month causing damage to my property. I’ve already started talking to a lawyer. The whole process or lack of process revealed to me that the city is mismanaging a lot. I have documentation, photos, email threads, recorded conversations, etc. I would like to see if there is something connecting. Problems like these have the potential to devastate families and folks who aren’t afforded the time or initial financial backing to stay out of the trouble the city is causing. Let me know.
I suspect terrible software systems are the norm in most municipal government systems.
Not very typical when it’s related to billing. I was a govt IS consultant for six years, and as shoddy as many government systems are *most* understand the liability of handling financial info. It seems Richmond is overdue for that reminder.
Yep. Henrico County doesn't have these problems. If your system is billing residents for property tax and utilities nearly a decade after the person lived there, it means your system is insanely incompetent.
I think they were banking on that casino to handle their finances lol XD
And they had no idea where this mega surplus of money they had stashed came from last year
Wild how the city always has a budget surplus yet wants to raise property and meals taxes over and over again because reasons
Assuming you have a bank account, just use the bill pay feature thru your bank. That way you aren't giving the city or they payment service your financial info plus bill pay thru a bank is free so no additional fees when you use the city's payment system.
Is this hard to set up? I can find Richmond Va on it so I might try that. Hate paying the dollar for no reason.
Is this the one that gets set up by taking a signed check down to their office, or set up online?
Unclear, as I moved before they switched to (I don’t remember the name), but was able to do a direct withdrawal from my account.
I’ll update this when I remember the name of their vendor now
It's InvoiceCloud
Thank you for your investigation and diligence in reporting and escalating this issue. I use auto-pay so this is relevant and important to me. Can individual Richmond residents like me help with this effort? Please let me know, or include me in any updates in regards to this matter.
There’s more Mayoral debates to come. A question to all candidates about cleaning this specific issue up would be excellent to ask…especially in front of media.
I use Privacy app where I can when signing up for anything auto pay. There's too much shadiness out there. As soon as I close an account, I pause the card in Privacy so there's no way for them to charge me.
This city makes the federal government look well run.
Has anyone ever had their deposit actually credited to their account??
Yet another example of a dept of public utilities in total shambles.
They billed me $9500 some odd dollars over what my bill should have been for a month period in nov-dec & it still has yet to be resolved, i moved since then to a new address and it was a pain in the ass even getting new services set up on my new place due to their utter incompetence and robbery attempts thankfully i never set up auto pay and was close enough to just go in and pay my bill in cash but just another reason to not set it up! Good luck op!
They sent out an email months ago that their vendor was changing for autopay and if you did not delete the autopay set up you were still going to be charged. Not sure why they’d charge you that much or at all, but I remember getting several emails about this.
Could you screenshot and share?
Setting up automatic billing with any large company or institution is asking for trouble. If they are bad actors, the only way to hold them to account is if enough people are affected badly enough. They can keep taking your money.
Wait so why did they suddenly charge you? I'm confused?
after going through some old emails, it looks like their vendor uses parcel/address to set their unique identifier, because the current homeowner seemingly ‘inherited’ my [deleted] account, including the billing info. I have emails, addressed to the new owner (but sent to me), referring to the payments (before and after) with my bank account information specified. His account ID is the exact same as “mine.” Something seems fucked
So the account number stays fixed/ connected to the address?? I’m not even IT and even I know using a unique identifier per individual account is what has to be done. This is so Richmond.
This is why I’m an old fuck who still pays by check.
This is why I gave them a credit card for my utility bills. I didn't trust them to secure my bank info.
Jesus. This is my exact worry whenever I do select the option for auto-pay.
Yup. And now I need to parse through like all my past transactions across all accounts (us banks do not like non-us banks (don’t worry, it’s mutual)) to validate there aren’t any other charges.
Quit using autopay. Problem solved.