Complaints against banks drop more than twofold in September vs its peak in April-May, BoR reports
Recent Bank of Russia data show the emergence of a trend towards a decline in the number of incoming consumer complaints, as their number has by late Q3 almost returned to pre-pandemic levels. Annual data will however be affected by this April’s surge in consumer complaints — when coronavirus-induced restrictions were put in place.
The Bank of Russia handled as many 20.4 thousand complaints in 2020, which is mostly in line with the February data. In the first nine months of the year, a total of 212.8 thousand complains were registered — 15.1% up on the same period in 2019.
The end of Q3 saw a substantial reduction in consumer complaints against credit institutions. This occurred on the back of Bank of Russia efforts at settling problems connected with creditor refusals to grant credit holidays. Of help were also the regulator’s steps to ensure consumer loans are restructured.
The total number of complaints against banks declined 2.2 times vs the April number, including an
Insurance companies were the subject of 28% fewer complaints in the first nine months of the year.
In the course of conduct supervision — a practice enabling the regulator to track down financial organisation-to-consumer interactions — cases of incompliance were detected and measures taken to address them, including striking several microfinance companies (MFCs) off the register. As a result, problems related to debt collection by MFCs gave rise to almost 45% fewer complaints, while 13.5% fewer complaints were related to MFCs in general. A third fewer complaints were reported about misseling.
More details are available in the Appeal Handling Report, January-September 2020.
