For Indebted Russians, a Holiday Staycation

Consumers who binged on credit wind up on Russia’s no-fly list.

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By Jake Rudnitsky and Anna Baraulina

December 10, 2015 at 4:48 PM UTC

This article is for subscribers only.

This article is part of the December 14, 2015 issue of businessweek.

Russians looking to find some warm weather this holiday season are running into some tricky roadblocks. In November the government imposed strict new bans on travel to Egypt and Turkey, two of the most popular vacation destinations for Russians, in response to the terrorist bombing of an airliner over Sinai and the shooting down of a military jet near the Turkish border with Syria. The government has also restricted the foreign travel of citizens with overdue loans and unpaid bills.

A record 1.4 million Russians have been grounded this year through September under a law that bans deadbeats from leaving the country, according to Russia’s Federal Bailiff Service. About 600,000 are now on the no-fly list, says the agency, which enforces the ban. “The growth rate in overdue debt has been huge, up 40 percent this year, and it will get worse before it gets better,” says Elena Dokuchaeva, chairman of Sequoia Credit Consolidation, one of Russia’s largest debt collection agencies, which is partially owned by Goldman Sachs.