Ebilling is now available for Vicksburg’s utility customers.

The city’s Water and Gas Department began accepting requests for ebilling on Nov. 19, Information Technology Department director Billy Gordon said, adding information about the program has been included on the city’s website and its Facebook page.

He said customers who want ebilling can sign up by calling 601-636-3414, or going to the city’s website at www.vicksburg.org, click on the Water and Gas Department site under utilities, go to “paperless billing.”

“We’ve had about 40 people so far apply for paperless billing,” he said Monday.

The city sends out monthly utility bills to its residential and commercial customers listing charges for water, gas, sewer and garbage services. Customers have been able to pay their bills online since September 2011, and the city began working on online billing in January.

Gordon said it took time to get the ebilling portal on the city’s website because Transaction Warehouse, the company that handles the online payments for the city, had to merge the billing and payment activities.

He said the city began testing ebilling in early November using a limited number of customers.

“We used six customers,” he said. “Some of them were people using epay and had requested online billing, and some were city employees.”

“This will definitely help us by making billing easier,” said Tammye Christmas, Water and Gas Department director. “The response has been very good. Most of the people requesting the service have done it through the form on the website.”

She said it was too early to tell how much the electronic billing will save the city in postage. The city has about 10,000 utility customers and five billing cycles. One cycle in September sent bills to 9,800 customers, costing the city $3,700 in postage.