Starting from February 1, Ukrainian banks will introduce limits on card-to-card and card-based money transfers. These restrictions will apply to clients without confirmed income.
Points of attention
- The memorandum on ensuring transparency in the payment services market was signed by dozens of Ukrainian banks, as well as payment systems.
- Transfer limits will be different for clients of different risk groups.
- Banks will also set limits on the number of accounts for customers without confirmed sources of income.
Why did the NBU announce new restrictions?
The fact is that last month, several large Ukrainian banks and associations signed a Memorandum on ensuring transparency in the functioning of the payment services market.
The innovations will affect exclusively those users of banking services who cannot confirm the legitimacy of their income.
Key objectives of the Memorandum:
combating fraudulent financial schemes, in particular, the use of "drops" (customers who, for a fee, provide access to their cards or accounts for dubious transactions);
reduction of the shadow economy;
bringing the Ukrainian banking sector into line with the unified standards and requirements of EU legislation.
It is worth noting that this document has already been signed by dozens of Ukrainian banks, as well as 2 payment systems, in particular: Oschadbank, PrivatBank, Raiffeisen Bank, FUIB, Universal Bank, Sense Bank, payment systems NovaPay, RozetkaPay.
What restrictions will apply from February 1, 2025?
The innovations will apply not only to P2P transfers, but also to outgoing transfers using IBAN details in national and foreign currencies.
What is important to understand is that they are introduced for clients without confirmed income, depending on which risk group they belong to:
"high" risk group clients — limit of UAH 50,000 per month;
clients of "medium and "low" risk groups — limit of 150 thousand UAH per month (from June 1 — 100 thousand UAH).
In addition, it is emphasized that each bank will use its own assessment criteria when opening an account and in the process of further servicing the client.
The NBU draws attention to the fact that banks will also introduce restrictions on the number of accounts (credit, deposit, and accounts for payments under state programs are not taken into account).
What is important to understand is that a client without confirmed sources of income can have no more than 3 accounts in the same currency.
Financial institutions will conduct an in-depth study of the business activities of newly created individual entrepreneurs (up to 6 months) of taxation group 1 and monitor account transactions according to the amount of average monthly income. Individual entrepreneurs on the general or simplified system of groups 2-3 will be checked according to their own criteria of a risk-based approach.
