The introduction of QR-codes will require compensation for losses of airlines by tens of billions of rubles

Victoria Pavlova

According to these calculations, airlines will lose 15 billion rubles each month on the requirement to check QR codes. No matter how the authorities strive to vaccinate all Russians, not every traveler will have a QR-code: someone fundamentally refuses to get vaccinated, someone will simply expire the validity of the code. As a result, S7 expects a reduction in passenger traffic on domestic flights by up to 50%. Another ₽20 billion airlines can lose on ticket refunds by passengers who have nothing to show at the time of departure. As a result, the industry's losses in the period from February to June 2022 may amount to 60 to 90 billion rubles.

Naturally, air carriers will not stand on the sidelines and will demand compensation from the state for losses. First, many airlines, especially Aeroflot, are used to receiving subsidies. So in 2022, state support for the sake of curbing ticket prices could reach a record 27.5 billion rubles. Of these, 9.3 billion will go to support transportation between regions bypassing Moscow, 12.3 billion - to subsidize tickets to the Far East, Crimea and Kaliningrad, and another 5.9 billion rubles - to support the unified Far Eastern airline Aurora.

Today, by the way, the head of Aeroflot, Mikhail Poluboyarino, attended a meeting with Vladimir Putin, where he complained about the global crisis in the industry, about the fact that by the results of seven months of 2021, they themselves recovered only 70%, which will turn out to be a pre-pandemic level of traffic come out no earlier than 2023. Poluboyarinov did not forget to note that only thanks to state support (the national carrier carried out an additional issue of shares for 80 billion rubles, a significant part of which was bought by the state) Aeroflot, which received a loss of 123 billion in 2020, was able to fulfill its obligations.

And the aviation industry has a strong administrative resource: Minister of Transport Vitaly Savelyev was the head of Aeroflot last year, and Rossiya Airlines, according to Poluboyarinov, will be based on domestically produced aircraft. Here Sergey Chemezov is already interested in the financial well-being of the airlines: the United Aircraft Corporation, which is part of Rostec, has consolidated virtually the entire aircraft manufacturing industry. Savelyev's reaction was not long in coming: a couple of hours after Poluboyarinov's meeting with Putin, the Ministry of Transport announced the study of subsidizing airlines during the validity period of QR-codes.

In general, airlines have every chance of getting the support they need. Not at all like small and medium-sized businesses. A year ago, the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade calculated that in seven months of 2020, small and medium-sized businesses received 1 trillion soft loans. It looks impressive, but this money still needs to be returned, albeit at a reduced rate. The main beneficiaries here were state-owned banks: Sberbank provided 43% of soft loans, VTB - 21%.

For private business, the available support is not enough, even taking into account the reduction in social contributions. Polls between the MoySklad service and the OFD.ru fiscal data operator showed that in the first half of 2021, 64.7% of entrepreneurs did not notice any support at all, and 38.1% noted weak government support. And primarily because of the bureaucracy. 20.8% of respondents say that it is simply impossible to fulfill all legal requirements in a pandemic, and 17.3% of entrepreneurs note that it has become more difficult to work due to increased state control. This is logical: firstly, the supervisory authorities got rid of last year's ban on inspections and issuing fines, and secondly, those who want to receive even a penny subsidies automatically subscribe to field inspections.

Even the much-needed (albeit very insignificant - 1 minimum wage per employee) subsidies for paying salaries during the lockdown were received by only 2.2 million organizations and individual entrepreneurs, who employ 3.7 million employees. Although at the moment there are 5.78 million enterprises in the register of SMEs, which employ 14.65 million people.

Each subsequent wave of covid becomes more and more, and state support - less and less. So the last November lockdown brought business, which even according to the most conservative estimates of the government should have lost 60 billion rubles, only subsidies for salaries of one minimum wage. According to the government's plans, support should be received by 2 million people, on which the state will spend 27 billion rubles. Government support is more than twice as short as the losses of entrepreneurs.

So being an air carrier is not bad at all, even when QR-codes are being entered. Much better than a small private business.