The Bank of Russia suggests amending the bill on transferring payments to public sector employees to a Mir card

A bill regulating, among other things, the term for transferring payments to public sector employees to Mir cards passed its first reading at the State Duma on 22 February. The Bank of Russia suggests that some amendments designed to protect interests of this category of card holders are introduced for the second reading.

‘The government has tasked us with protecting card transactions of Russians from possible external factors. To deliver on this task, we elaborated Mir, a national payment card system. Payments from budgetary and extra-budgetary funds are to be transferred to these cards. Today, the deputies have approved the necessity of setting the terms for this transfer legislatively, – Olga Skorobogatova, a deputy Governor of the Bank of Russia, commented on the decision of the State Duma. – We suggest that these terms are updated for the second reading to make the transition to Mir cards gradual and as smooth as possible.’

The Bank of Russia suggests that Mir cards are issued to new public sector employees and pensioners from 1 July of this year, while those currently employed in the public sector should switch to them until 1 July 2018. Current pensioners will be switched to Mir cards progressively, as the cards they are holding expire. This process is to be completed by 1 July 2020.

The Bank of Russia believes that conditions for issuing cards to pensioners should remain unchanged. Currently, most banks issue and service their cards free of charge. This procedure should hold and the Bank of Russia will keep it in check.

Importantly, the bill retains the actual right of the citizens to choose the way they receive wages and pension payments. If the budgetary funds are currently received in cash or transferred to the account with no card attached, the receiver will retain this opportunity when the amendments become effective. If budget payments are transferred to an international payment card, a Mir card is to be issued to receive them.

Almost 3 million Mir cards have been issued by now. The deployment of the ATM network of participating banks has almost been completed, while as much as 85% of the terminals network is ready. According to the amendments for the second reading, all credit institutions are supposed to completely deploy their networks by 1 July 2017.