Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed amendments to legislation establishing a cooling-off period for consumer loans. This is reported on the Kremlin's website.
According to the law, it will be possible to receive money on a loan or loan from 50 thousand to 200 thousand rubles only 4 hours after the conclusion of the contract. If the amount exceeds this threshold, the borrower will receive the funds no earlier than 48 hours later.
The cooling-off period will not be set for loans and borrowings up to 50 thousand rubles, as well as for mortgage and educational loans, car loans (provided that the money is credited immediately to the car dealer's account), loans for refinancing previously assumed obligations, unless this leads to an increase in their size.
The purchase of goods on credit without a cooling-off period will be possible only if the consumer is personally present in the store or organization. The deferral also does not apply to loans and borrowings if several co-borrowers accept the obligation under the agreement or the borrower has guarantors.
The law provides that the Central Bank will be able to change the parameters of the cooling period, taking into account the results of an analysis of the effectiveness of measures taken by a credit institution to combat fraud: for example, to shorten the cooling period for bona fide banks, whose activities for at least two quarters will meet the criteria of the regulator. Similar criteria will be developed later.
The law establishes financial responsibility for unscrupulous market participants. So, when issuing a loan or loan in violation of anti-fraud regulations and when a criminal case is initiated for embezzlement of money, the lender will not be able to demand that the borrower fulfill his obligations, charge interest and transfer the debt to collectors.
According to the law, banks will not be able to issue electronic means of payment, including bank cards, to individuals from the regulator's database on cases and attempts of fraudulent transactions.
According to their current cards, a limit is imposed on transfers to other people — no more than 100 thousand rubles per month. This will apply to citizens whose information is in the database, and the bank has not exercised its right to block the card.
The law stipulates that banks will not be able to transfer more than 50 thousand rubles to tokenized (virtual) cards within 48 hours from the moment of their issue.
Banks and microfinance organizations, in accordance with the law, will have to request a borrower's INN and verify it in state information systems, in particular in the database of the Federal Tax Service of Russia.
MFIs will transfer money to the account only if the information about the borrower and the recipient of the money match. If information about a person is in the database of the Bank of Russia, MFIs will have to refuse to conclude a loan agreement with him. To do this, MFIs will have access to information from the regulator's database from March 1, 2026.
According to the law, the exchange of information between lenders and credit bureaus will be accelerated to almost online mode. It will also help to avoid cases when an individual makes several loans and loans at once from different banks and MFIs in a short time under the influence of fraudsters.
