What new awaits Russians in December: double pensions, social benefits, 13th salary

Two pensions and two social benefits

In December, many Russian pensioners will receive two pensions at once – for December and for January, since government institutions do not work in the first half of January due to the New Year holidays. Pensions for December will begin to flow to Russians on December 1, and for January – from December 25. At the same time, the January pension will be increased, since from January 1, 2024, the amount of the insurance pension will be indexed by 7.5%.

The same applies to all social payments, the date of enrollment of which falls on the period from January 1 to January 8. That is, in December 2023, Russians will receive two social benefits, disability pensions, survivors’ pensions, and so on. However, all social payments for January 2024 will not be indexed, since, unlike old-age pensions, their indexation period in 2024 is set not from January 1, but later.

Mark Goikhman, analyst at the Capital Skills Financial Academy, comments:

“The news about double pension payments is a double positive. Firstly, recipients will be pleased with the fact that there will be an increased amount immediately. Secondly, it is very important that she arrives just in time – during a period of significant expenses for a worthy New Year’s Eve. Indexation of pensions by 7.5% will be somewhat ahead of schedule, since Rosstat will calculate actual annual inflation only in January. According to the statistics agency, as of November 27, accumulated inflation since the beginning of this year amounted to 6.7%. Taking into account the upcoming traditional year-end price increase in the coming weeks, the estimated figure could reach 7.5%. However, the inflation recorded by the Central Bank of the Russian Federation and observed by the population itself is also double – 15.1%, that is, twice as much as determined according to the Rosstat methodology. It turns out that in order to compensate for the current price increase, the second payment needs to be doubled.”

Fines for imposing services on consumers

In December, changes to consumer protection legislation come into force. Fines are introduced for imposing additional services, work or goods on consumers. Thus, such actions may include the imposition of loan insurance by banks and microfinance organizations (MFOs), the sale of smartphones along with some additional accessories that are not included in the basic package, or, for example, an offer from beauty salons to purchase a care complex. hair along with a haircut. The fine will range from 2 to 4 thousand rubles for officials of organizations and from 20 to 40 thousand rubles for legal entities.

Andrey Loboda, director of communications at BitRiver, comments:

“Fines alone are not enough here. Unfortunately, the level of financial literacy in Russia remains extremely low, despite the government’s efforts to change the situation. Often, premiums and bonuses for banking and insurance managers depend precisely on whether they were able to impose something else on the client in addition to his basic request for the service. Therefore, unscrupulous employees resort to all sorts of tricks, including insurance or an expanded range of services in the contract by default. This can be observed even in mobile applications, when when applying for the same loan, many checkboxes immediately become active, ultimately increasing the cost of the payment. There is a golden rule that you can refuse such services within two weeks. Alas, not everyone still knows about this. Banks also offer more unfavorable conditions for rates if the client does not agree to insurance, forcing him in fact to take something that he may not need. Unfortunately, the desire to quickly buy something or get a loan often prevails over common sense, when you can read in more detail the contract or terms of service to exclude unnecessary things from them. Therefore, fines in this case are not the most effective method of solving the problem. This must be combated fundamentally by changing the very policies of banks, companies or insurance organizations, whose services must be absolutely clear and transparent.”

Penalties for refusal to consider consumer claims

Serious liability is being introduced for sellers and service providers for refusing to consider consumer complaints and suggestions. For failure to respond within the prescribed period to a consumer’s application, officials will pay a fine in the amount of 10 to 30 thousand rubles, and legal entities – from 100 to 300 thousand rubles.

Alexander Balakirev, a specialist at the Intercession law firm, comments:

“You can monitor compliance with the law through citizens’ requests. The consumer must record that he sent a complaint or proposal in the prescribed form and did not receive a response to it, or was refused consideration. To prove that the consumer actually applied, it is necessary to do this in writing: on paper or on the company’s website. However, it is not clear whether communication with the seller through an aggregator fits the definition or whether it is necessary to contact the seller directly. However, the fines look hefty for both officials and organizations. Of course, the consumer may receive delusional proposals, but nothing prevents the seller from responding to them with at least a formal reply: “We have considered your complaint/suggestion, but we do not see our guilt/the advisability of its implementation. Thank you for your offer”.

Labeling of soft drinks

New labeling rules for soft drinks come into force on December 1. They apply to drinks packaged in glass or polymer containers. The exceptions are juices, nectars, fruit drinks and plant-based drinks. Manufacturers and importers of such drinks will have to enter information about their products into the national catalog, set up the process of ordering and paying for labeling codes, applying these codes to the packaging and sending a report on the application of the codes to the monitoring system.

Ivan Samoilenko, managing partner of B&C Agency, comments:

“In our country, labeling has been introduced for the last few years – for different groups of goods. The purpose of labeling is to strengthen quality control and track each unit of goods from the manufacturer to the buyer. Labeling will not greatly affect the cost of the product – on average, it is 1-2% of the cost of the product, depending on the type of product. For soft drinks, this means a price increase of up to 50 kopecks maximum. A much larger part of the costs is raw materials, packaging and transportation.”

Restrictions on the sale of vapes

In December, a ban on the sale of vapes and liquids for them that have not been labeled comes into force. The purpose of the innovation is to reduce the scale of illegal trade in vapes and increase the collection of excise taxes on liquids for them.

Viktor Zykov, member of the coordinating council for the fight against tobacco and nicotine-containing products under the Ministry of Health, comments:

“Mandatory labeling of vaping liquids will significantly improve the situation on the market and replenish the budget. But, most importantly, this will lead to a decrease in the affordability of nicotine liquids for young people. However, we cannot stop there. The devices themselves – vapes – are not labeled, although their variety on the market is quite large, and their origin raises questions. In our country there have already been cases where vapes exploded at the time of use; these products must also be subject to the strictest control and labeling.”

Receiving the 13th salary

Some categories of Russian workers will traditionally receive their 13th salary in the last month of the year, which has been paid since Soviet times as a monetary incentive for high performance in work. True, in the current labor legislation there is no obligation on the employer to pay the 13th salary; it is issued at the discretion of the owners of the enterprises. However, many Russian companies pay this type of incentive. In particular, the 13th salary exists in a number of budget organizations, the banking sector, large oil and gas and metallurgical companies.

Ivan Samoilenko, managing partner of B&C Agency, comments:

“The 13th salary or New Year’s bonus (in the amount of salary) is a good motivational incentive that many companies use. But not all organizations use this tool, and such encouragement is usually enshrined in the documents when hiring a person. Traditionally, the 13th salary is paid by the largest Russian companies in the mining and banking sectors, and IT structures. This year, perhaps, workers in the defense complex will be able to count on their 13th salary, where salaries have increased significantly and the motivational component has strengthened.”

Notices to Benefit Recipients

From December 1, recipients of benefits for the birth of a child, as well as for children under 17 years of age, will receive notifications on the Gosuslugi portal if for some reason the Social Fund of Russia is unable to credit them with funds. In addition, Russians will be warned if termination of the provision of social benefits.

Ivan Samoilenko, managing partner of B&C Agency, comments:

“A very practical innovation – thanks to such notifications, many Russians will be able to learn for the first time about the payments they are entitled to from the state. According to the Social Fund of the Russian Federation, the share of such citizens is about 10% in the country as a whole. Accordingly, now the situation may change and the number of Russians who do not know about the benefits they are entitled to will decrease.”

And

– New rules for authorization on Internet resources. From December 1, authorization on Internet resources, sites and information systems must be carried out using a mobile phone, using the State Services portal (USIA), the Unified Biometric System or any other information system that provides authorization and complies with established requirements for information protection. Such systems will include exclusively Russian services.

– Women prisoners will be allowed to look after their children. Arrested and convicted women will be able to raise their children longer while in prison. Currently, mothers can only be detained with children under 3 years of age. Then the baby must be handed over to relatives or sent to an orphanage. According to the changes coming into force in December, the age of such children is raised to 4 years.

– New rules for crossing the state border. From December 11, new rules for exiting and entering the territory of Russia, as well as grounds for invalidating a foreign passport, diplomatic passport and service passport, will come into force. According to the new rules, a foreign, official or diplomatic passport will be invalidated if the owner has changed his first name, last name or information about the place and date of birth or the validity of the document has expired. Also, documents will lose force if a person for any reason ceases to be a citizen of Russia.

In addition, citizens who, for any reason, have been prohibited from traveling abroad will be required to surrender their foreign passports to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, to employers who have restricted travel abroad due to access to state secrets, or to bailiffs. This must be done within five days after receiving the notification of the travel ban, otherwise the passport will be invalidated. It will be returned after the restriction is lifted.