ALPINE — The City Council is considering the possible replacement of USTI, the city’s current utility (gas, water and sewage) billing software system after receiving a list of top five choices from city staff.

Customer Clerk Supervisor Carmen Rodriguez presented details of her team’s review of multiple software systems at the February 18 council meeting, including the pros and cons that led to selection of the top five. The team reviewed 11 options over about 18 months, Rodriguez said.

The list five included (in order of most to least recommended) included: CUSI, Fund View,  Muni-Link, MyGov andSmart Fusion.

Rodriguez, Mayor Catherine Eaves and council members pointed to sketchy, error-filled service for residents and an often-complete lack of responsiveness from the city’s current system, USTI, as reasons for the search for a replacement.

“We urgently need something that works better,” Rodriguez said. “What we currently have is just no longer surprising, just no longer acceptable. It doesn’t meet our expectations. We are unable to do our job … without good software.”

Eaves and Councilmember Darin Nance supported Rodriguez, interjecting that they had heard from a lot of resident complaints.

Residents have been frustrated by multiple issues with the online billing system, Rodriguez said, including system errors that have prevented them from accomplishing tasks such as making payments and resetting their passwords, and others that have caused account summaries to be inaccurate — not reflecting payments that were made or posting some twice. USTI’s response to these issues has also been frustrating, she said.

“We don’t know — that’s not an answer I can give our customers,” Rodriguez said. “And unfortunately, that is a very common answer from them.”

The team researching possible new systems checked three references for each of the five top picks. Those were strong for CUSI and during demonstrations, the team found it user-friendly and that it contained many useful tools for customers.

Council members had questions regarding the cost of transitioning to a new system and whether CUSI and the other possible options could be merged with new financial software, which they also believe is needed.

Councilmember Reagan Stone asked what the increase in cost would be if CUSI was selected. City staff estimated the increase would be about $15,000 per year, with onboarding of the new system costing about $32,000 and yearly costs of about $34,800.

Stone, staff and other council members postulated that the increase could be made by the money saved in postage, staffing and office supplies by combining water and gas billing and by possibly changing the billing date or adding a grace period in consideration of when paychecks are sent out from social security and the school district.

Regarding integrating a new billing system with future financial software, Rodriguez advised that Fund View offered financial software to work with its utility billing software making integration easier but limiting the city to that system, while CUSI offered a list of financial software on the market that its system works with.

City staff advised that the next step is for council to approve a recommendation so that money can be set aside in the budget to start the transition.

Rodriguez explained CUSI would enable the city to:

  • Send mass notifications to customers, such as water main breaks
  • Scan and store documents
  • Allow staff to attend bi-monthly, online training sessions.

For residents, CUSI offers the ability to:

  • Pay by credit card at the city office and online
  • Pay by bank draft
  • Schedule reoccurring payments
  • See graphs of their usage for the last 12 months and compare their usage to the previous year’s usage.