Banking services in Russia theory and fact — страница 4

order to the bank to transfer the money in one day, you will be lucky if they do it two days after that, then when this special branch of the central bank gets the money it takes it 3-5 days to record the operation and just after that it will send the money to the next bank, and even the bank to which you have transferred the money will keep it for 2-3 days before they will tell you that they have already received it.[18] This is only if that payment operation is inside your city. If you are transferring the money to another city then the special central bank branch of your city transfers the money to the same branch in the town you are transferring the money to and there the money is recorded again and after 3-5 days the bank receives it.[19] The shortest time in which you can

transfer money from one bank to another inside one city is 7 days, and between two cities about 10 days. According to the law it has to take only 3 days in local operations and 6 days in interurban operations - the time while the special branch of the central bank keeps the money.[20] It is also not a very short period of time but better than 15 days - the period it takes to transfer money in reality. This has led to an increasing number of illegal cash payments between companies. Payment operations for companies outside Russia are more complicated than anything else in the bank system. You must sign a contract with a foreign company about buying goods there. Then you have to show the contract on that bargain to the Customs with all prices and the list of goods purchased. After

they have checked everything they issue a passport and register the number of the transaction. Only after that you are allowed to send an exact amount of money for which you have the passport. After this, you are allowed to give an order to the bank about transferring the exact amount from your rouble account number to your currency account number. In other words you are buying currency. It takes the bank up to 5 days: it depends on availability of that currency. After the money is exchanged you are allowed to give the payment order to the bank to transfer the money. Than the money goes to the special central bank branch and only after that goes to the foreign bank.[21] But the procedure isn’t finished yet. After getting the goods the duty-agencies are checking everything and

just after all taxes and custom duties are paid the passport of the bargain can be closed.[22] The whole operation takes about 8-10 days, including all customs checks. According to the law it has to take you only 3 days when the special central bank branch keeps the money, plus the time needed for custom-agencies to check and register the documents.[23] Thus, it seems that payment operations are set up with the aim of delaying money transfers and of keeping money inside the country. It looks as if all clients just interfere with the activity of the banks and they even behave as if it would be better for everyone if clients just gave their money to the banks for their needs and would not interrupt their work again with their requests. The main aim of the credit system world-wide

is to raise investments for the economy of the country. So the credit system should attract clients to borrow money from the bank by offering low interest rates and, simple procedures. The bank has to invent a means of doing that, because the welfare of the bank depends on it. In our city in Russia, it looks as if our credit system is opposed to a European-type credit system and is created to scare off all borrowers with high interest rates and the unwillingness of the banks to give any loans. Now I will show it with facts. According to the law, credit operations for the private sector exist in our city. Banks should give credit to people to buy expensive goods.[24] Yet banks refuse to do that for anyone for any reason, because it does not give them big profits and takes away a

certain amount of money for up to 10 years. Thus, this operation is almost nonexistent. On the other hand people rarely want to take such loans. First of all because the companies where they work cannot take big loans for the replenishment of current capital. For this reason, companies have to work on prehistoric equipment, without having any chance to pay suppliers and to pay wages to workers. How can people consider taking a loan for 10 years if they have no stable income? A vicious circle persists.[25] The credit system for companies is developed better than that for the private sector. But even to companies, banks do not want to issue any loans because of the high risk of losing money. Before if a bank lost money on loans it was compensated by high profits on the financial