Russians complain more about MFOs and less about insurers and brokers
In 2026 H1, the Bank of Russia received nearly 211,000 complaints from financial consumers and investors, which is 15.7% more year on year. This was mainly due to a higher number of complaints against microfinance organisations (MFOs) and complaints falling outside the regulator’s remit.
Complaints against MFOs continued rising (+63%) primarily because of unscrupulous debt relief companies offering borrowers to write off their debts in full without any consequences. Ultimately, these firms failed people, leaving them with outstanding debts to creditors.
The number of complaints about car lending, mortgage lending, and cyberfraud declined by 33.3%, 10.4%, and 34.4%, respectively. Contrastingly, the number of bank customers’ complaints about denied transactions and account restrictions increased by 32.7%. This was associated with the antifraud measures taken, which also led to a 2.3% uptick in the total number of complaints against credit institutions.
Complaints against insurers were down in number on account of a reduction in complaints about compulsory motor third-party liability insurance (-9.4%) and life insurance (-30.3%). Furthermore, the number of complaints against brokers dropped by a third. The collective investment market also saw an improvement, with the regulator receiving fewer complaints against management companies regarding unit investment funds (-29.7%) and against non-governmental pension funds (-10.5%).