Online payment increase on Moscow’s residents

Digital payments otherwise referred to as ‘e-payments’, have become increasingly popular among citizens of Moscow in paying for the city’s essential services. Through the use of the mos.ru portal and the “Gosuslugi of Moscow” mobile app, residents can pay for housing, public utility services, transport fines and educational services, including the ability to top of their children’s school card.   “The possibility of online payments saves huge amounts of time for the citizens of Moscow as they no longer need to travel to make their payments, as well as freeing up the time of administrative staff. Today, a growing number of citizens use the mos.ru portal or “Gosuslugi of Moscow” mobile app to pay their bills for the city’s essential services conveniently. Since the start of the year, more than five million transactions have been made in total across the portal and the app.” - The press service of the Department of Information Technology of Moscow.     The most popular payments made by citizens using e-payments is for housing and utility services. Users of the mos.ru portal can receive and pay their Unified Payment Document online, review a detailed list of services and send water meter readings. This format is especially convenient for citizens travelling abroad, as they can simply connect to the internet on any device to make a payment online. According to the Moscow Department of Information Technology, since the beginning of 2019 the number of payments made across the platforms in this category has exceeded two million, with in excess of 1.6 million made through the mos.ru portal.   The second most popular payment to be made across the platforms is the top-up of the personal accounts of children attending school to pay for meals. This year, more than 1.2 million payments have been made for this purpose through the portal or mobile app.   In third place is payment for educational, cultural and leisure services, including sports memberships and classes, workshops, kindergarten and child-care services. More than 930,000 transactions have been made across this category.   In fourth place is payment for fines, including violation of parking and traffic rules. Citizens can pay their fines any time, with some of them eligible for a 50 discount if paid within 20 days of their issue date. Users are also able to review photos from CCTV cameras in the case of traffic violations and accordingly make any relevant appeals where they may have been fined incorrectly. In this category, more than 750,000 payments have been made, of which more than 630,000 have been paid through the mos.ru.   According to a survey conducted by the Department of Technology analysts on the use of e-payment services in Moscow, today it takes citizens no more than three minutes a month to pay for the city’s services online. This is in comparison to a previous time of 50 minutes per month to pay for housing, public utility services, communication and other services in banks or ATMs.