And yet the world – “Mir” – Newspaper Kommersant No. 200 (7401) of 10/27/2022

My friend, who was vacationing in a friendly country, said that he had no problems with shopping, despite the fact that Mir cards do not officially work there. In one of the shops, he looked for a jacket that fit in size and style, but not for the price. He did not have such an amount in cash, and the cards were only from Russian banks. The seller, realizing that the client is ready to make an expensive purchase, but can only pay by bank transfer, offered two options – transfer money to his employee through the SBP or pay for the purchase with a Mir card. As proof of the seriousness of his intentions, he took out a POS terminal from a Russian bank from under the counter. And the deal went through.

According to a Kommersant source in a large bank, recently small merchants in the resort towns of friendly countries have begun to practice card-to-card transfers, having adopted this form of payment from Russians who have moved there. Then an employee with a Russian account will transfer money to the account of the store or directly to its owner. But this scheme, the banker admits, is “gray” and may raise legitimate questions from the tax authorities.

The second option, according to Kommersant’s interlocutor, is absolutely legal and not only small, but also large merchants, and even hotels are already testing it. The bottom line is that a foreign trade and service enterprise (TSE) through an intermediary opens a ruble account in a Russian bank. The intermediary enters into an agreement with this bank for acquiring services for a foreign merchant (to change the cash register, update firmware, etc.).

Then the intermediary receives the agreed number of POS terminals, arrives in the country where the merchant operates, and connects it to the bank’s acquiring network in the same way as any domestic store – via the Internet. Payment through the POS-terminal goes to the merchant’s account in a Russian bank, and after the conversion, the money is transferred to his account in a foreign bank. The scheme is not much different from paying for goods in online stores, provided that they are received by self-delivery.

According to a Kommersant source, this scheme is also good because the payment itself does not go through a foreign bank, which means that it does not have cooperation with the Mir system, for which the Western authorities threaten with numerous punishments. In addition, international payment systems strongly recommend representatives of the largest banks and local regulators not to work with Russian colleagues. But chasing every small shop to find out if it has accepted a Mir card payment can be too expensive.

Thus, while representatives of regulators from friendly countries are discussing options for settling settlements with the Central Bank, and officials are making optimistic statements on this topic, business at the local level is solving Mir issues without any of their participation.