Pasco moves to allow online permit payments; council to decide utility fee policy later

Deputy City Manager Sigdel briefed the City of Pasco City Council on June 23 on payment transaction fees and plans to enable online payments for permit fees within weeks. Sigdel said the city currently spends about $530,000 annually on payment-processing fees (primarily for utilities), and that adding permit transactions would increase that amount.

Sigdel described common municipal approaches: absorb all fees, set transaction limits for card payments, or pass fees to customers. He said the typical cost would be about 2.75% per credit-card transaction and approximately 1.1% for ACH bank withdrawals. "Overall, at this time, you're looking at about $530,000 annually," Sigdel said when summarizing current processing costs, and he estimated absorbing all non-utility fees would cost the city roughly $160,000 annually based on prior transaction volumes.

Councilmembers expressed support for launching online permit payments quickly while delaying any change to utility payment-fee policy until after the city's Paymentus contract ends in November. Several members favored a policy that absorbs ACH fees but passes credit-card fees to payers to incentivize lower-cost payment methods. Councilmember Grimm said he would "be for absorbing the ACH fees, but passing on the credit card fees," and urged waiting until the November contract timing to consider any utility changes.

Council consensus directed staff to prepare a code amendment to allow online payments for permit fees under a non-utility model (staff to bring proposed language and implementation steps). Staff will return in October or November with options for utility-account payment handling and any provider change aligned with the existing contract expiration.