Business Continuity Statement

How Online Water Bill keeps water association billing, customer portals, and support available through infrastructure incidents, vendor outages, and staff turnover. For contractual uptime, backup, and support targets, see the Support Agreement & SLA.

Effective date: June 18, 2026 · Version: 1.0

This Business Continuity Statement describes how Online Water Bill LLC (doing business as OnlineWaterBill or OWB) plans to maintain and restore the services water associations rely on during a disruption. It is an informational summary for boards, clerks, and auditors. Contractual commitments appear in the Support Agreement & SLA and Service Agreement; if this statement and those documents differ on a specific commitment, the signed agreements control.

1. Purpose and scope

Water associations need billing to continue through storms, vendor incidents, and personnel changes. OWB operates a fully hosted platform so associations are not dependent on a PC in a clerk’s office or a single on-site backup tape.

This statement covers:

  • Critical platform services OWB provides
  • How data is backed up and recovered
  • How OWB detects, responds to, and communicates about incidents
  • What associations can do to keep collections and customer service moving during a disruption
  • How OWB itself operates as a remote company without a single physical office dependency

This statement does not replace an association’s own emergency plans for field operations, water delivery, or physical office access.

2. Critical services

For each association tenant, OWB provides cloud-hosted access to:

  • Staff billing, meter reading, and administrative tools
  • Customer self-service portals and online bill presentment
  • Online payment processing through a certified third-party processor (see security and privacy policy)
  • Automated email notifications and reminders (where configured)
  • Reporting, exports, and data access for authorized staff

Associations may continue accepting cash and checks at the office regardless of portal availability; those payment methods do not require the customer portal to be online.

3. Hosting and architecture

OWB runs on managed cloud infrastructure rather than association-owned servers. The platform is designed so associations do not install billing software on a local PC, maintain their own database server, or manage their own off-site backup tapes.

OWB uses commercially available hosting, data storage, and payment services operated by third-party providers under industry-standard security and availability practices. OWB does not publish a vendor-by-vendor map of that stack on this page.

OWB monitors platform health and upstream service status internally and publishes a consolidated operational view at onlinewaterbill.com/status.html. A disruption may affect only part of the platform (for example, online payments may be unavailable while staff billing tools remain accessible, or vice versa, depending on the incident).

4. Data protection, backups, and recovery

Association data stored in the platform remains the property of the association, as described in the Service Agreement.

4.1 Backup practices

As described in the Support Agreement & SLA, OWB maintains:

  • Automated daily backups of platform data
  • 30-day backup retention
  • Point-in-time recovery capability for operational restoration
  • Minimum 7-year data retention for records stored in the platform (customer records, billing history, payments, meter readings, and related data)

4.2 Recovery objectives

OWB targets restoration of platform access and data integrity as quickly as practicable after a confirmed incident. Critical issues (system down, payment processing failure, or suspected data loss) receive 24/7 response with a 2-hour initial response target and an 8-hour resolution target, as defined in the SLA priority table.

Actual recovery time depends on the nature and scope of the incident, including third-party provider outages outside OWB’s direct control.

4.3 Data export

Associations may request data exports during normal operations or upon termination, as described in the Service Agreement and SLA. Associations should also retain archival copies of historical billing from prior systems; OWB does not import legacy invoice history from other vendors.

5. Service availability

OWB commits to 99.5% uptime for the platform while an association actively uses the service, excluding scheduled maintenance, as detailed in the SLA.

  • Scheduled maintenance is performed during low-usage hours when possible (typically 2:00 AM–4:00 AM Central Time)
  • Scheduled maintenance does not count toward downtime calculations
  • Emergency maintenance may occur without advance notice to address critical security or stability issues

6. Incident response and communication

6.1 Detection and response

OWB uses platform monitoring, upstream status signals, and customer reports to detect outages and degradations. When an incident affects associations, OWB:

  1. Confirms scope and assigns priority under the SLA
  2. Works to restore service or implement a workaround
  3. Communicates status updates through appropriate channels
  4. Documents cause and remediation when the incident is resolved

6.2 How associations are notified

  • Status page: onlinewaterbill.com/status.html for live component status
  • Direct outreach: email or phone to designated association contacts for widespread or prolonged incidents
  • Support channels: phone at (479) 530-2705, email, and the built-in ticketing system (24/7 for the lifetime of the association’s use of OWB)

Associations should designate at least two contacts who can receive incident updates (for example, the billing clerk and a board officer or backup staff member).

7. Payment processing continuity

Online payments are handled by a PCI DSS Level 1 certified third-party processor. OWB does not store full card numbers on association servers. Payment security details are in the security and privacy policy.

If online payment processing is unavailable:

  • Customers may still pay by cash or check at the association office
  • Staff may record offline payments in the platform when billing tools are available
  • OWB support can advise on interim workflows based on what is affected

Settlement timing and dispute handling remain governed by the payment processor’s terms and the Service Agreement.

8. Association operational continuity

Associations can reduce billing disruption by planning ahead:

  • Multiple authorized users: Grant portal access to a clerk and at least one backup (treasurer, board member, or alternate staff) so billing is not tied to one person
  • Document the monthly cycle: Rates, due dates, mailing steps, and who approves the billing run
  • Keep non-digital payment options: Cash, check, and drop-box procedures continue during portal outages
  • Retain legacy archives: Maintain historical billing records from prior systems for audits and old customer inquiries
  • Check status before calling: Review System Status during widespread internet or weather events to see whether OWB or a related service is affected

OWB onboarding includes hands-on setup and training so a backup staff member can run a billing cycle if the primary clerk is unavailable.

9. OWB operational resilience

Online Water Bill LLC is a fully remote company based in Newton County, Arkansas, with no central office that associations depend on for service delivery. Platform operations, support, and engineering do not require staff to access a single physical site.

  • Support is available by phone, email, and built-in ticketing 24/7 for the lifetime of the association’s use of OWB
  • Critical incident response does not depend on business-hours-only availability
  • OWB may rely on geographically distributed cloud regions provided by its infrastructure vendors for redundancy

OWB maintains administrative access controls, secure credentials, and documented procedures so more than one team member can respond to a platform incident.

10. Events outside reasonable control

Neither OWB nor an association is fully immune to large-scale events (extended regional outages, natural disasters, widespread internet failures, or third-party provider incidents). The SLA force majeure section applies to contractual obligations. During such events, OWB will use commercially reasonable efforts to restore service and communicate with affected associations.

11. Review and updates

OWB reviews this statement periodically and updates it when infrastructure, support practices, or contractual commitments change materially. The effective date at the top of this page reflects the latest published version.

Associations with questions about continuity planning for an upcoming board review or audit may contact OWB using the information below.

12. Contact

Online Water Bill LLC (OnlineWaterBill)
Email: brie@onlinewaterbill.com
Support phone: (479) 530-2705
Sales & demos: (479) 858-2002
Mailing address: PO Box 33, Deer, AR 72628