For Immediate Release: June 20, 2018
Media Contact: Callie Lutz, 530.552.3320
Visit: ButteCounty.net | Facebook | Twitter
The state of California is transitioning to a new Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) vendor on June 30, 2018. Because of this transition, a statewide 24-hour EBT outage/black-out period is scheduled from 11 p.m., Saturday, June 23, 2018, through 11 p.m., Sunday, June 24, 2018. During this outage, cardholders will not be able to access their EBT food or cash benefits.
This scheduled, one-time EBT outage is required to support the transition of EBT vendor services from Conduent (formerly Xerox) to Fidelity Information Services (FIS).
Notices were mailed to EBT clients the first week of June. Additionally, staff at all Butte County Department of Employment and Social Services (DESS) locations have been notifying residents of the outage, including providing informational fliers and posting signs within service center lobby areas.
The EBT website (www.ebt.ca.gov) will also be unavailable during the outage. Cardholders calling the EBT Customer Service Help Line (1-877-328-9677) during this period will be reminded of the outage via a recorded message available in 11 languages; Armenian, Cambodian, Cantonese, English, Farsi, Hmong, Lao, Mandarin, Russian, Spanish and Vietnamese. Due to the website and call centers being down, cardholders will be unable to check their balances during this outage.
To help ensure community members are aware of the outage, all authorized EBT retailers have been notified of the outage and encouraged to share this information with their employees and customers. DESS encourages cardholders to plan ahead and ensure they make their shopping trips before the outage starts on Saturday night. All services should be available as normal after the outage.