Number of complaints to Bank of Russia increases by more than a third in 2022 Q1
In January—March 2022, the Bank of Russia received 94,900 complaints, which is 38.1% more year-on-year.
This increase was caused by the sanctions and the resulting higher uncertainty, among other reasons. A considerable portion of applications were requests for explanations of the measures implemented to support households and businesses, the temporary procedure for foreign cash transactions, the suspension of on-exchange trading, the acceptance of payment cards amid the restrictions, and so on. The Bank of Russia did not only provide prompt explanations of the changes through various communication channels, including by responding to people’s questions, but also restored applicants’ rights where violations were confirmed.
The number of complaints against credit institutions rose by 15.5%. Refusals to dispense cash from a foreign currency deposit or a bank account, as well as the absence of cash in ATMs were among the most frequent topics of the complaints against banks related to the sanctions.
Without taking these topics into account, the number of complaints against banks remained at the level of January—March 2021, whereas the number of complaints in retail lending decreased significantly. Specifically, the number of complaints about hard selling of extra services in addition to a loan edged down by 21.7% owing to borrowers’ right to get a refund for such services and the prohibition for banks to put check marks in agreements in advance.
The number of complaints about hard selling of extra services by microfinance organisations (MFOs) decreased 1.5 times. A surge in the number of complaints in the MFO segment regarding credit histories (2.4 times) and cyber fraud (2.3 times) was mostly technical and associated with the transition to a new recording method (since February 2021, one application with several topics is taken into account as several applications). The overall growth in the number of complaints against MFOs reached 20.9%.
The main reasons for the increase in the number of complaints against insurers (+33%) were refusals to sign compulsory motor third-party liability insurance contracts and problems with the issuance of electronic insurance policies.
In the context of the sanctions, there was a notable rise in the number of applications about securities market participants (7.2 times). They were mostly related to the suspension of trading and the restrictions on transactions with foreign securities or instruments linked to them.
As before, the main topic of complaints about misselling (+8.6%) was incorrect sales of investment (40.6%) and endowment (13.2%) life insurance policies. New requirements for insurance products with an investment component and the introduction of the rules for selling investment products by banks are expected to help reduce the number of complaints about misselling.