While PayPal is starting activities on the Russian market, two domestic e-currencies, Yandex.Money and Money Mail.ru, are introducing their own innovative features.
Since late November, Yandex.Money has allowed its users to send money via email. To send a so-called ‘money letter’, a user only needs a Yandex.Mail account and a Yandex.Money e-wallet. The recipient can have an e-mail address in any domain name and does not need to have a Yandex.Money e-wallet.
“‘Money letters’ are the fastest way to put talk into action,” said Egor Ganin, head of the Yandex.Mail service.
‘Money letters’ are as easy to send as ordinary ones. A user enters an email address and writes a message as usual, but instead of attaching a file from his computer, the sender attaches some Yandex.Money from his account.
“The recipient then has the option of putting the whole amount on his e-wallet immediately or, if the amount exceeds 100 rubles, putting it on a bank card,” Ganin added.
High tech help for state coffers
Money Mail.Ru, meanwhile, has introduced a service that allows users to pay taxes via this payment solution free of charge.
To receive tax information from Money Mail.Ru, the user simply enters his or her tax identification number. For users that need to pay taxes, they only need to provide their name and address and make the payment via Money Mail.Ru. The service provides a bank receipt to confirm payment, and users can even pay taxes before they are due.
Tax information is provided directly from the database of the State Information System on State and Municipal Payments. As such, Money Mail.Ru’s data is constantly up to date, and tax payment information also enters the state’s database.
“We make complex things simple: we make sure that our users can get information about their financial obligations as soon as possible. And if they owe money, Money Mail.Ru users will be able pay in a few clicks, ” says Vadim Rumyantsev, head of Money Mail.Ru.
A joint venture of Russia’s search giant, Yandex, and the national savings bank, Sberbank, Yandex.Money is one of the largest online payment services on the Russian Internet with 16 million registered users and 9,000 new e-wallets created daily. Recently, Yandex.Money launched international services: now its users can wire funds to individual and corporate bank accounts in a range of Western countries Moreover, several internationally-oriented Internet stores now accept payments via Yandex.Money in a bid to attract Russian e-shoppers, as highlighted in EWDN’s research study on Russian e-commerce.
The two other leading Russian e-currencies are WebMoney and the QIWI-Visa Wallet. Money Mail.Ru, a service of the Mail.Ru Group, has more modest traction. The group declined to provide any figures related to this service.
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