City Councilman Edmund Ford today paid the remaining $8,952 balance on his MLGW commercial accounts. The payment brings his accounts current and avoids the cutoff of utility service. In the past 30 days, Mr. Ford has made more than $16,000 in payments to MLGW.

Ford paid a $4,368 balance on his mortuary account on Monday, March 26. He also had a past due balance of $8,952 on another business account linked with the mortuary. That balance was paid in full at 3:52 p.m. on Tuesday, March 27. Mr. Ford met all payment arrangements and his services will remain on. Mr. Ford made the payments at one of MLGW's Community Offices. His residential account balance was paid-in-full in two payments. The first was a $732.10 on Feb. 14 and the other on March 8 of $767.59.

Last month, Mr. Ford received a letter from MLGW stating he had until the close of business today to pay the full balance of his accounts or face disconnection of services. This enhanced collection effort is part of a new MLGW initiative to collect outstanding bills that are more than 90 days and/or $900 past due.

It is the goal of MLGW to work with all customers who are having trouble paying their bills and to work out payment arrangements that are workable for the customer and beneficial to MLGW. The utility offers a number of payment programs and arrangements. In analyzing accounts such as this one, MLGW is taking even greater steps to improve its collections efforts and tighten certain policies on large overdue accounts. Customers having trouble paying their utility bills are encouraged to call MLGW's Customer Care Center at 544-MLGW (6549).

MLGW is the largest three-service public power utility in the nation, serving more than 420,000 customers in Memphis and Shelby County with some of the lowest combined rates in the U.S.