“Inconvenient Fee?”  We’ve had a couple of members contact us to question why we charge a convenience fee for a method of payment that should be more convenient to the co-op.  I am assuming there may be a couple more of you with that same question, so let me explain. 

Processing a credit card payment is easier for a business to manage IF there are many transactions.  At this time, we have very few credit card transactions in a month.  In addition, the fees that we must pay the credit card company for the convenience really are $3.95/transaction.  You’re probably thinking that if we didn’t charge a fee, we’d have more users, and that’s probably true, but the question is still, how many would use their credit card.

We have over 1000 (20%) of our members using ACH (the automatic payment from their checking/savings account), and because those fees are very small, and the number of users is quite large, we offer that service without charge.  This is the most efficient and cost-effective method for us to collect electric bill payments, and we do our best to control costs.  I would like to encourage you to think about signing up for ACH, assuming you have not already.  I have used North Star's ACH myself for many years, and really like not having to ever worry that my bill won't be paid on time (and I'm just across the hall from the cashier).

Back to the convenience fee for the credit cards....I am guessing that when the numbers support bundling the credit card fees into the electric rates and the bills of all the members, we will re-evaluate charging the fee to the specific users. 

In the meantime, I hope you like the early email notification and having your billing information accessible through the ebill site.

If you have any other questions or comments about this, or any other issue regarding North Star, please let us know.

We really appreciate it when members voice their opinions.  It does matter.