Alternatives to the “MIR” maps abroad

Due to sanctions, foreign banks refuse to use MIR payment cards. In September, the US Treasury announced that sanctions could be imposed for working with the MIR payment system. Since that moment, most banks, including those from the CIS countries, have stopped accepting Russian MIR cards.

Let’s look at what alternatives to the “MIR” maps now exist. After the announcement of the threat of sanctions against the payment system, Turkish banks were the first to refuse, then Kazakh, Vietnamese and Uzbek banks made a similar decision.

However, not all foreign banks have stopped working with Russian cards. The Russian payment system continues to operate in South Korea, Armenia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, South Ossetia, Abkhazia.

In March, the Mastercard and Visa international payment systems stopped working in Russia, so the MIR payment system remains one of the few ways to use the card abroad.

In order to pay with a card or withdraw money abroad, Russians can open an account with a foreign bank, receive a card and replenish it from an account with a Russian bank.

Another option is to use money transfers — Golden Crown, Contact or Unistream. In this case, the money can be received at the branch of the partner bank.

The Chinese UnionPay payment system continues to function, although Russian users may have problems using it if the card issuer is a Russian bank that has fallen under sanctions.

At the moment, work is underway to create a joint Russian-Turkish system for settlements. Settlements will not be made in the currencies of unfriendly countries in order to avoid the imposition of sanctions.

Another possibility of transferring funds is the use of cryptocurrency. On the crypto exchange, rubles are exchanged for foreign currency through tokens. After that, in another country, the cryptocurrency can be converted into local currency, dollars or euros.