The Financial Ombudsman Service reported an increase in net profit amid a decrease in client complaints in 2022

In 2022, financial institutions implemented over 78% of the decisions approved by the financial ombudsman’s service in relation to their clients, sending about 1.8 billion rubles to its fund. targeted contributions. Compared to 2021, the amount decreased by 3.6%, but the service’s profit grew by 37%, primarily due to the placement of funds in bank deposits. The money went to “replenish targeted funds to finance the statutory activities.”

At the end of 2022, the net profit of the Financial Ombudsman Service increased by 37%, to RUB 193.5 million. while reducing the number of customer complaints. This follows from the results of the service’s activities disclosed on June 1. In particular, last year it received almost 153.2 thousand applications, 15% less than a year earlier, of which about 105 thousand complaints were accepted for consideration. For comparison: the Central Bank received over 368 thousand complaints last year, which is 18.4% more than the result of 2021.

Experts note that the Central Bank and the financial ombudsman have “somewhat different functionality” when considering citizens’ appeals. According to Pavel Samiev, director general of the Biznesdrom agency, the financial ombudsman service is the third party in the dispute between the client and the financial structure, it resolves disputes out of court. The Central Bank takes administrative measures in relation to financial organizations – issues instructions, recommendations, imposes fines.

The service functions mainly due to targeted contributions from financial organizations (about 4.9 thousand legal entities), which amounted to 1.8 billion rubles over the past year. (reduction by 3.6%). The participant fee is calculated by multiplying the number of applications accepted for consideration by the rate (its amount may depend, in particular, on the type of organization and the outcome of applications). In addition, 38 million rubles were paid to the service last year for considering applications from third parties. (down 23.6%).

The growth of net profit was ensured by funds placed on deposits (2.6 billion rubles). Income from interest on deposits amounted to 203 million rubles, which is 1.6 times more than in the previous year. Funds were placed in the largest banks at 7.4–10.15% per annum. As Yury Belikov, Managing Director for Validation of Expert RA, explains, the organization “profitably allocates its target capital and due to this, together with targeted contributions, covers the costs of maintaining activities.” According to him, “last year’s growth in deposit rates following the key rate led to an increase in interest income,” while the deposit portfolio itself “did not grow much.”

Funds are spent mainly on personnel, in particular, the cost of maintaining the management apparatus grew by 1.8% at the end of the year, to 1.64 billion rubles. “With an average number of employees of about 560 people, the average cost of wages for a staff unit is over 200 thousand rubles. per month gross with all deductions,” notes Mr. Belikov. The service also increased spending on targeted activities by 18%, to 114 million rubles. Almost 260 million rubles. amounted to the cost of conducting an examination when considering applications. As explained in the service, in 2022, the cost of servicing and maintaining the premises increased due to the growth of tariffs and the cost of operating and utility costs, as well as the costs associated with wages in connection with the indexation.

The service said that last year’s net profit is aimed at replenishing targeted funds to finance statutory activities, taking into account the planned funding gap of the income and expenditure estimates for 2023. As Mr. Belikov notes, all the organization’s expenses are targeted, covered from the endowment fund: “Therefore, one can observe such a situation that profits are growing, expenses are growing at the same time, target contributions are decreasing and, as a result, endowment capital is decreasing. This is what happened in 2022.”

Olga Sherunkova