MEDIA RELEASE
City officials would like to remind residents to use caution when attempting to pay their water bill, tax bill or police department fine online.
“We want to make sure that residents know the correct way to access the official payment portal for the City of Cedartown,” said Public Information Officer Aimee Madden. “We have a secure payment portal on our official website that is operated and maintained by Government Window, a leading provider in ePay solutions.”
Madden said several customers have let City Hall staff know that they paid their water bill online through an unaffiliated service. There are many online payment services out there, but only one that is affiliated with the City of Cedartown, Madden explained. “Customers are getting charged late fees and one even had a disruption in service because they had used an unaffiliated service. These services collect payment information from the customer, cuts a check on the customer’s behalf and then mails it to City Hall.”
The problem, Madden said, is the long processing time. “They do eventually pay the bill, but there is anywhere from a two week to three-week wait. During that wait time, a customer’s bill can become delinquent. We don’t want any other customers going through this, so we want to make sure they are accessing the correct site.”
Madden said the best way to ensure that a customer is accessing the correct portal is to first pull up the City of Cedartown’s official website at www.cedartowngeorgia.gov. “There are so many misleading sites these days, so if you can alleviate that by visiting a site that you know is legitimate, it can save you a lot of confusion.” Madden said that once a resident is on the City’s official site, it’s a matter of scrolling down and locating the green icon that looks like a wallet. It is labeled as “online bill pay.” Once that icon is clicked, it will take to you a page that tells you more about the payment portal and gives the user direct access. “That is the method that I would recommend because you are taking out the step of locating the portal yourself – we do that for you on our site.”
Residents can also type www.cedartownpay.com into their preferred browser to access the portal. Madden reiterated that users must type the full address into the address bar; don’t rely on a Google search. “A search engine can pull up several payment services that look very polished, very professional, but unless you know exactly what you are looking for, you can get confused.”
Those with questions or those who need more assistance with online bill pay can call City Hall at 770-748-3220.