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- Silence of barriers: fines for the imposition of services increased to 500 thousand rubles
Silence of barriers: fines for the imposition of services increased to 500 thousand rubles
The deputies of the State Duma finally approved amendments to the Administrative Code, toughening the responsibility for forcing buyers to purchase unnecessary goods and services. For officials and individual entrepreneurs, they will amount from 50 thousand to 150 thousand rubles, for legal entities — from 200 thousand to 500 thousand rubles. Where the imposition occurs most often and whether an increase in fines will lead to an increase in the cost of basic goods and services for end customers is in the Izvestia article.
Increased responsibility
The imposition of unnecessary services is especially common in online ticket purchases, Roman Chikun, an expert at the Popular Front, told Izvestia. Analytics". Additional insurance and paid options are often connected automatically, and the preset mark becomes a typical trap for the user. A similar situation is typical for the financial sector. When obtaining a loan or mortgage loan, customers are often persistently offered related insurance and services, without which the transaction could formally be dispensed with.
This practice is also common in the automotive market, where the total cost of a car increases due to the mandatory purchase of additional equipment, he noted. In the housing and communal services sector, management companies often include services in receipts that are not agreed with tenants. In addition, such violations are regularly found in paid medicine, among telecom operators and in the tourism industry.
"The previous fines were symbolic — 2-4 thousand rubles for officials and 20-40 thousand rubles for companies — and disproportionate to the profits that the business extracted from the imposed services, they were simply included in the costs," the expert said. — The new fines, which have increased by 25-50 times, create an economic incentive to "make it cheaper not to violate." The idea is to make it unprofitable for companies to force people to spend undesirably, rather than for them to compensate for the risk by increasing the base cost.
The imposition of additional goods and services has become so widespread today that many buyers perceive it as a familiar element of any transaction, Inna Litvinenko, associate professor of Economics and Management at the Russian State University of Social Technologies, told Izvestia. Sellers often explain such actions by caring for the customer and striving to offer a "complete package".
Almost every day, consumers are offered more than they originally planned to purchase. People regularly encounter this practice when ordering on marketplaces, connecting subscriptions to educational and entertainment online platforms, buying air and train tickets, arranging insurance products, and receiving medical and cosmetic services.
"The new rules significantly strengthen financial responsibility for such actions," she said. — Despite the seriousness of the amounts, it is not necessary to expect an automatic increase in prices for basic goods and services.
In her opinion, it is much more likely that businesses will start looking for more sophisticated and less straightforward ways to interact with customers, trying to formally comply with the requirements of the law, but at the same time maintain the same sales models.
An informed choice
In the field of trade in machinery, sellers often convince customers to apply for additional protection, extended warranty or purchase accessories, Peter Shcherbachenko, associate professor at the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, told Izvestia. In the banking segment, when consumers apply for a loan or other financial product, they encounter attempts to connect paid subscriptions and services that increase the total cost of the transaction.
"Misseling, the practice of unfair sales in which banks, insurance companies or brokers mislead customers, remains a separate problem of the financial market," he stressed. — This may result in misrepresentation of information, concealment of risks, or the sale of a product that does not meet the needs of the customer, but is more beneficial to the seller. A typical example is the offer of complex investment instruments instead of simple deposits or basic insurance solutions with an incorrect description of profitability and termination conditions.
According to him, the provision of incomplete or distorted information about financial services also applies to forms of unfair behavior. Clients may be promised a guaranteed income or may rely on alleged government guarantees where they are not provided for by law. The terms of early termination of contracts and possible loss of funds are often omitted, and the focus is solely on the positive aspects of the product.
— The imposition of services without a full review of the documents remains a common practice. In some cases, the contract is considered concluded upon payment, while the consumer is not provided with the full text of the terms or ignores his disagreement with the connection of an additional service, the expert said.
Another problem is the sale of financial products that do not correspond to the level of knowledge and experience of the client, he noted. Complex tools can be offered to citizens without assessing their financial literacy, which creates increased risks and contradicts the interests of consumers. Opaque pricing is also among the violations. Customers are being misled about fees and the real cost of services, using hidden fees, or charging double fees for the same financial product.
— Finally, there is a substitution of products, when one financial instrument is given out for another, — explained Peter Shcherbachenko. — For example, an investment or insurance product is presented as a bank deposit or offers the services of companies without a license under the guise of legal activity.
At the same time, direct transfer of penalties to consumers seems unlikely, the expert believes. The purpose of fines is to punish violations, not to compensate for business costs. Their key task is to reduce the scale of the imposition, which could potentially lead to lower costs for citizens. However, it is still impossible to completely exclude the indirect impact of such measures on the price level.
Izvestia sent requests to the Ministry of Energy and the Federal Antimonopoly Service, but no responses had been received at the time of publication.
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