OREANDA-NEWS.  January 18, 2012. Vladimir Putin: Good afternoon, colleagues. As you know, motorists face numerous problems – bad roads, traffic jams, and lack of parking spaces. Today we will discuss car inspections. A new law on inspections entered into force on January 1, 2012. So far we have visited one of the stations, and I saw how it works. In general, everything is well organised. Igor Shuvalov headed the committee, the working group, which drafted the decisions that were discussed in the State Duma before becoming law.

Work has begun, and today I would like to talk to you about how it is being carried out, what problems you see, and what aspects should be modified. We visited a station where your colleagues began inspecting vehicles. They paid attention to information support, for instance combining the issuance of inspection cards and compulsory auto insurance. This would be convenient for people, of course. Let’s discuss this.

But first I would like to discuss the most important thing, namely the fact that from now on inspections will be held at service stations that will be certified not by regional officials or by federal agencies or even by the State Road Traffic Safety Inspectorate, but rather by the Russian Union of Auto Insurers. This is an issue of fundamental importance. With this in mind, I would like to draw attention to another possible trap, which is the potential ambition to monopolise the market. This, I think, is unacceptable, considering the interests of consumers. Also, we should not underrate cost effectiveness of enterprises involved in this activity.

A while ago I spoke to a head of one of these enterprises. He says that the amount of work has increased but revenue has not grown. This a significant point that we all must heed. Naturally, regional authorities can play a positive role – I mean that they can allocate some subsidies, especially benefits for low-income and vulnerable social groups, primarily the disabled, retirees, and so on. In Moscow a maximum price of 690 roubles has been established, and retirees with a single car are entitled to free inspection. And practically every region has this option and a need for instituting a fixed price barrier. The methodology for this has been developed by the Federal Tariff Service. There is no place for any undue hesitation. Naturally, it will be necessary to take into consideration regional differences: we must set up mobile stations in locations where fixed service stations are lacking. Naturally, today at least, traffic police should supply the necessary quantity of inspection stickers, every station should have them at its disposal. There is seemingly no such shortage as yet, I mean that the New Year has just begun, and the high season of vehicle inspection is spring, as we know.

In general, I have looked over how inspections are run: essentially one vehicle can be inspected every thirty minutes and receive an inspection sticker. This is a good, significant step forward, in my view. The main thing for all of us is to properly organise work and make the process convenient for people, but again we should not prevent enterprises from making a profit. A service station should be able to make a decent profit. All currently operating stations can operate in this regime until 2014, but new setups will have to be certified in 2014. 

Let’s discuss all current issues related to inspections. Please, who will begin?

Vyacheslav Lysakov (Chairman of the Co-ordination Council of the Freedom of Choice interregional public motorist organisation): May I begin?

Vladimir Putin: Go ahead, Mr Lysakov.

Vyacheslav Lysakov: Thank you. I had a preliminary discussion with my colleagues – all of us are monitoring the situation on servicing not only passenger vehicles but lorries and so one. Currently we see two problems that can be solved and need to be solved. We should protect this market from swindlers and unscrupulous operators. Unfortunately, under current law the Russian Union of Auto Insurers certifies operators only through paperwork; they cannot examine every operator’s equipment and so on. There is a well-known case that has gained a lot of attention on the Internet: there was a business that had no equipment at all but was legally certified. This business legally obtained a heap of inspection stickers, and now this company can sell these stickers. This is the first thing. We will do our best to resolve this problem in the new State Duma. We will have roundtables and so on. And we will think how to legally protect the market from blatant swindlers. This is the first thing. 

Another case involves a business with some equipment that had been certified but does not use its equipment for car inspection; but it also could sell these inspection stickers. There is a solution to this problem. I know some young programmers in Perm, they have proposed a software monitoring system for all stages of car inspection and printing the sticker at the final inspection stage only. This is one option. We will surely meet with Mr Bunin (Pavel Bunin, president of the Russian Union of Auto Insurers), and Mr Kiryanov (Deputy Interior Minister Viktor Kiryanov), we will meet with our colleagues, we will discuss how to safeguard the system, maybe with software, maybe in a different way. But so far these are two conspicuous problems that are obvious. I believe that car inspection problems gained excessive attention from journalists because in this period after the New Year there isn’t much news to report. We do not see any particular problems as yet, but we are monitoring the situation and we will continue to track it and make adjustments both in terms of legislation and organisation.

Vladimir Putin: Mr Lysakov mentioned a problem, an insignificant problem at first sight, but nevertheless I want to draw Mr Shuvalov’s (First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov) attention to this – I mean the equipment that is necessary at service stations. There shouldn’t be excessive requirements, and there should be no requirements specially tailored and meant just for a certain producer or seller.