OREANDA-NEWS. Russian banks can introduce card issuance and servicing fees. Credit institutions will also have to cancel their loyalty programs if the Central Bank keeps the acquiring commissions for online retail and medical institutions at 1%. This way, the regulator decided to support online commerce and medical institutions during the pandemic.

Banks may lose more than 10 billion (up to 15 billion, according to some experts) rubles due to the regulator's restrictions. Credit institutions will have to make up for losses at the expense of their clients. Experts are sure that such functions as an online applications (online banking) will remain free of charge, as they are beneficial to the companies themselves, but, for example, cacheback and free card servicing will have to be forgotten. In addition, it will lead to reduce incentives to use non-cash payment methods.

«In Russia there is a different business model in the market of non-cash payments than in Europe: most services for clients are free, they are subsidized from the income from acquiring. Thanks to this model, there are at least two cards per person in Russia. The share of non-cash turnover has increased from 25 percent in 2014 to 65 percent in 2020," said Vice President of the Association of Russian Banks Alexei Voylukov.

It is noted that Russians will have to pay even for calls to call-centers of the banks they use.