Moscow, Russia, November 9, 2017. Yandex.Money, Russia’s leading online payment service, released a new application Yandex.Gas. The app allows drivers to pay for fuel remotely without the need to leave their car and having to stand in line at the cash register. It’s a project in cooperation with Mastercard payment system and LICARD company (a subsidiary of PJSC LUKOIL).
LUKOIL gas stations in Moscow are already available in the app, and in the nearest future it will be supported at all 2250 gas stations of the LUKOIL network in Russia. According to the data provided by Autostat, LUKOIL stations are used for filling up by 46.2% of Russian drivers. Further on, the service will be available at other gas stations.
With geolocation enabled, the application shows the closest gas station. The driver needs to select the pump number, the amount of fuel or the sum one would like to fill up for. Payment can be made with Yandex.Money e-wallet or by Mastercard. Yandex.Gas app can remember the card data, so there’s no need to enter the relevant data manually every time. The service is commission-free — the user only needs to pay for the cost of fuel, with all discounts and special offers available at the gas station being valid. Additionally, the LUKOIL loyalty cards can be easily added to the application in order to accumulate points online.
«Yandex has built a whole ecosystem of services helping users in different life situations, — says Ivan Glazachev, CEO of Yandex.Money. — Every month, these services are used by 14,5 million drivers: people pay transport tax and traffic fines using Yandex.Money services, they use Yandex.Navigator to plan the best route to the desired point and find a parking lot, and use Yandex.Parking to pay for that. Now, we’re going to make a driver’s life easier at gas stations. Yandex.Gas is the first remote payment service for gas in Russia with such a wide coverage of the gas stations network».
«LUKOIL company has always been the leader in launching innovative services. Yandex.Gas is not an exception. The service helps in situations when every moment is precious. Given the driver’s desire to fill up as soon as possible and taking into account the extensive use of contactless technologies, we believe that the demand for payment via application will be high», — says Denis Ryupin, CEO of LICARD.
«The rapid development of payment technologies allows to solve various everyday tasks much faster. Convenient and secure payment methods is something that both customers and merchants need today, — says Ivan Isaenko, Head of Market Development, Mastercard in Russia. — This year Mastercard is celebrating 20 years of its work on the Russian market. We are doing our best in order to make global innovations accessible for Russian customers. Together with our partners we are launching products, that will make our life easier, and we are happy about that».
Next year, the list of available payment methods will be expanded with other options, such as bank cards of other payment systems and Apple Pay contactless payments. In addition, there will be a special Yandex.Gas API that will allow any gas station network to connect to the application on their own — no need to update or replace software or cash registers in each separate gas station. The fuel pumps at the stations will be gradually equipped with QR-codes, so drivers won’t have to specify stations and pumps numbers manually and will only need to scan a QR-code.
According to Yandex.Money data, the average check at the gas station in 2017 is 774 RUB (=$13). In 2016, Russian drivers spent 2,9 trillion RUB (=$49,3 bln) on gas (in accordance with the data provided by Autostat).
About Yandex.Money
Yandex.Money is the largest electronic payments service in Russia, according to the 2017 survey by Mediascope. The service is the joint venture of the search engine Yandex (NASDAQ: YNDX) and Sberbank. Yandex.Money offers consumers easy, safe, and reliable methods of paying online on its own site and mobile app for Android, iOS, watchOS, Windows 10 and Windows 10 Mobile. Customers can also use Yandex.Money cards as a form of payment: both plastic and virtual Mastercards are available for issuing. The service hosts about 34 million user accounts with about 15,000 new accounts opened daily. By spring 2017, Yandex.Money has issued more than 600,000 plastic cards and 11 million virtual Mastercards.
Yandex.Money also offers online merchants Yandex.Checkout. The service allows merchants to accept all the online payment methods most popular among Russians: credit cards, e-wallets, mobile billing through the top Russian providers, and cash via over 250,000 cash-acceptance points all over the country and CIS. Currently, more than 76,000 online stores across the globe use Yandex.Checkout.
About Mastercard
Mastercard (NYSE: MA), is a technology company in the global payments industry. We operate the world’s fastest payments processing network, connecting consumers, financial institutions, merchants, governments and businesses in more than 210 countries and territories. Mastercard products and solutions make everyday commerce activities – such as shopping, traveling, running a business and managing finances – easier, more secure and more efficient for everyone. Follow us on Twitter @MastercardNews, join the discussion on the Beyond the Transaction Blog and subscribe for the latest news on the Engagement Bureau.
About LICARD
LUKOIL-Inter-Card (LICARD OOO) is a subsidiary of the LUKOIL Oil Company Group and is one of the leading processors for fuel cards, bank cards and loyalty cards accepted at forecourts. LICARD provides service to major corporations, government organizations, SME segment and individual consumers. Efficiency, use of today’s technological advancements and competitive edge are all at heart of the company’s philosophy thanks to which the number of our customers increasingly grows. Over 3700 sites, both in Russia and abroad, are equipped with LICARD System terminals accepting LUKOIL Fuel Cards and other card products. These include more than 2 250 LUKOIL branded stations and over 400 Partner-operated stations in 63 regions within Russia, as well as in Belarus, Poland, Belgium, Luxemburg, Bulgaria, Romania, the Netherlands, Azerbaijan, Serbia, Austria, Slovenia, Moldova.