Almost all large banks in Russia began to charge a commission for transferring to themselves from another bank. By such actions, credit organizations are struggling with the outflow of money. The doctor of economic sciences from the Southern Federal University shared his opinion that such a commission should be a fixed amount, and not a percentage of the transfer.
“Pulling” money is an operation that allows you to make a transfer through the bank application that a person uses daily, from a credit institution to which he receives a salary. Most major market participants charge for such an operation. For example, in Sberbank it is 1.25% of the transfer amount. In May, such a commission was also introduced by Rosbank – 1.75% of the transaction amount, but not less than 49 rubles, Otkritie Bank – 1.5% of the transaction amount, and VTB – 1.25% of the transfer amount, but not less than 30 rubles.
Professor of the Department of Finance and Credit, Faculty of Economics, SFU Oleg Sviridov said that the main purpose of introducing a commission is not to increase the income of these banks, but to put up protective barriers to the flow of money to other financial organizations.
“Bank balances are one of the bank’s liabilities. From the moment when a person receives a salary and until the moment he cashes it out, these funds lie on the correspondent account of the bank, and the latter conducts the operations that he needs with them. For example, all Gazprom employees receive their salaries on GazpromBank cards, and if they slowly spend their salaries from the same card, the bank manages to invest these funds in some company project. And if all employees of the company immediately transfer their money to their bank on the day of their salary, then GazpromBank will have to look for funds for their needs on the side.explained Oleg Sviridov.
The economist added that earlier the Russian financial market relied on foreign loans. If a profitable deal turned up for a bank, it did not use its own reserves, but money borrowed at a low interest rate abroad, and repaid the loan as soon as this or another similar deal brought in income. Now, due to the complications of international financial transactions, banks have turned their attention to the money of their depositors – and not only those who put their money into the account in the form of a deposit, but also those who simply keep their savings on the card in a non-cash form.
This has led to the fact that it has become a matter of principle for every major bank that their client’s non-cash money be tied to their correspondent account. To combat the outflow of money, fees were invented for transferring oneself to a card of another bank.
According to Oleg Sviridov, banks really have the right to set the amount of such fees on their own, but the scientist calls the percentage of the transfer amount and the commission for this transfer incorrect.
“The Federal Antimonopoly Service should take a closer look at this type of banking fees. After all, this is, in fact, an attempt to monopolize its economic power over customers. Transferring money to another bank is a service. It’s the same as if you came to a bank branch and asked to make such an operation, print out a payment. It may cost 20 or 30 rubles, but it will never cost two thousand, and this is exactly the amount obtained when it comes to transferring one hundred thousand rubles to oneself. ”emphasized Oleg Sviridov.
The SFedU professor noted that if “pulling money” always cost the same, for example, 50 rubles, then this would already bring the desired effect to banks – people would stop transferring money to correspondent accounts of competitors once again, but customers would still have such an opportunity. With the current percentage commission, when working with large amounts, people lose the opportunity to manage their own funds.
There are several ways to bypass the commission. Firstly, you can cash out money at an ATM of the credit institution to which you receive your salary and deposit it on the card at the ATM of the bank whose application you use. Secondly, the Central Bank of Russia reminds that it is possible to “pull” money without a commission through the Me2MePull service of the fast payment system (FPS). All transactions in the SBP up to 100 thousand rubles per month should be free.
