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Tomball council signals support to cap credit‑card utility charges at $500 per transaction
Summary
After staff presented rising credit‑card processing costs, Tomball council indicated consensus to limit card transactions above $500 to ACH/electronic check to reduce fees. Staff cited that last year processor charges were about $850,000 with collected fees covering roughly 35.5% of charges; current fiscal year collections covered about 31%.
Council workshop discussion on July 6 focused on rising credit‑card processing expenses and possible policy responses to reduce net costs to the city.
Finance staff presented a year‑over‑year analysis showing processor fees had grown substantially: last year processor charges for city card activity were about $850,000 while fee collections totaled roughly $301,000 (about 35.5% coverage). Through the end of May in the current fiscal year, staff reported processor charges around $617,000 with fee collections of $191,000 (about 31% coverage). Staff said card usage — particularly automatic utility payments and some large permit transactions — is increasing those costs.
Staff outlined options including raising the surcharge on card users, limiting card acceptance for large transactions, promoting ACH/electronic checking, or adding staff to manage reconciliation. After discussion about equity and operational impacts, council coalesced around a staff recommendation to limit card transactions above a set threshold; council members indicated $500 per transaction as the initial recommended cap and asked staff to return with an implementation plan and budget impact analysis.
The council and staff also discussed operational follow‑ups such as promoting ACH enrollment for utility customers, limiting card acceptance for permitting where feasible, and monitoring the cap’s effect before changing fee percentages. No ordinance was adopted at the July 6 workshop; staff will bring a formal recommendation for council action, including proposed language, implementation timetable and projected fiscal impacts.
Attributions: finance figures and operational details were provided by finance staff during the workshop presentation; the $500 threshold emerged during council deliberations.
