South Bend drive-thru lane for utility payments to close

SOUTH BEND — The drive-thru lane at the South Bend Municipal Utilities office at 125 W. Colfax Ave. will close for good at the end of the day Friday, Sept. 27.

Denise Linn Reidl, chief innovation officer with the city, said the lane will close in anticipation of the new customer service area that is planned for the first floor in the new City Hall.

The September utility billing statements that people received in the mail, however, incorrectly listed the drive-thru's last day as Thursday, Reidl said. People will have until Friday afternoon to pays bills with the drive-thru lane.

The city of South Bend hopes to move city operations from the County-City Building into the former South Bend Community School Corp. headquarters building at 215 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. by late spring in 2025, The Tribune has previously reported.

"Our surveys showed that 4% of customers might use the drive-thru," Reidl said.

She said the issue also was studied two years ago, and the results were similar in the numbers of customers that used the lane.

Reidl said the people who used the drive-thru lane seemed to have been doing it by habit. She said the city has placed educational instructions on other ways to pay bills on its website:

■ Pay by phone: Customers can call 3-1-1 or 574-233-0311 and follow the instructions.

■ Pay online: Customers can pay with credit cards or debit cards by going to utilities.southbendin.gov.Online accounts can be set up, or customers can make one-time payments.

■ Automatic bank draft: Applications for this are available by download from the website or at the South Bend Municipal Utilities Office, 125 W. Colfax Ave.

■ Pay by mail: Mail payment to: South Bend Municipal Utilities, P.O. Box 712, South Bend, IN 46634-7125.

■ Walk-in payments: The South Bend Municipal Utilities Office is open from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays and from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Fridays.

■ After hours payments: Customers can drop off payments in the drop box to the left of the Colfax Avenue entrance.

Email Tribune staff writer Greg Swiercz at gswiercz@sbtinfo.com.

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: South Bend Municipal Utilities office to close drive-thru lane