Let him “Hertz”! Who was given by Naftogaz consumers
During the war, the gas supply company Nafogaz Ukrainy, with the assistance of the state, significantly grew its number of consumers.
A mysterious company from Jewish Street in Odessa attached to significant financial flows.
Until recently, Hertz was not well-known in the market for handling utility bills and other payments. But when the Hertz payment system gained the exclusive right to be the only one in the Naftogaz client account, almost the whole country learned about it.
For those who don't know: the gas supply company Naftogaz Ukrainy (a subsidiary of the same Naftogaz) has recently been responsible for providing almost the entire population of Ukraine with natural gas. Each customer of the company anywhere in the country can create a personal account on its website and pay for the supplier's services from there. At some point, the gas supply company removed all payment systems from the menu, leaving only the Hertz system, owned by a company of the same name from Odessa. The Commander-in-Chief investigated why this happened.
Gertz LLC: “Money was lying on the road. I picked them…»
Before the full-scale war, Naftogaz's subsidiary LLC Gas Supply Company Naftogaz of Ukraine served almost 2 million households. After the Cabinet of Ministers took 26 regional gas companies from businessman Dmitry Firtash in May 2022 and handed them over to Naftogaz, the number of households in Naftogaz's portfolio increased to more than 10 million at once.
Sergey Belyaev is now the head of the gas supply company. From the official biography, you can find out that before joining the state-owned company, he worked as the Finance Director of DTEK Krymenergo and worked in senior positions in the Brusnichka retail chain. Both companies are owned by oligarch Rinat Akhmetov.
As one of the former top managers of Naftogaz told the Commander-in-Chief, the business model and the system of communication with people were as follows: unlike the Firtash obgas companies, the state-owned company decided to save money – it did not open service centers in the regions. If a person had questions about paying for a service, he either called the hotline, which was always busy, or went to his personal account on the Naftogaz website. In particular, through your personal account, you can track the entire chronology of payment, as well as pay for the gas used. To do this, various payment systems such as EasyPay, Portmone, LiqPay were added to the account.
As of July 2022, 2 million consumers used their personal account.
“We pursued a simple goal: as much competition as possible among payment systems with a low commission rate for gas consumers. In 2021, the Odessa company Hertz came to us and immediately asked for an exclusive right in your personal account. We refused her this, but added it to the general list of payment systems. Even then, Hertz put up a 2% commission on the payment. It was the highest rate among other payment platforms,” recalls the former Naftogaz employee.
According to the manager, about a month and a half ago, the situation suddenly changed. All payment systems disappeared from the personal account of clients, except for the most expensive Hertz. That is, the “exclusive” was managed to be knocked out by the mysterious Odessans. =”Hertz payment” />
Screenshot from the website of the gas supply company Naftogaz of Ukraine
“This is one hundred percent corruption,” concludes the source of the “Commander-in-Chief”. – There is no reasonable explanation for the fact that the leaders of the payment market were thrown out of their personal account, and the company with a high interest rate received privileges. According to my rough calculations, Hertz earned up to UAH 6 million from Naftogaz customers in a month. And maybe more.”
However, on November 8, the situation changed again. Naftogaz removed Hertz from the client's personal account altogether. Its place was taken by the state-owned PrivatBank and Sberbank.
Snapshot from the gas company Naftogaz Ukrainy's website
“Naftogaz saw how people on social networks reacted violently to the Hertz story. Therefore, we decided to put down the hype,” Naftogaz’s ex-manager concludes.
However, Hertz is not only interested in Naftogaz. According to the Commander-in-Chief, the company has also enforced its “exclusive” plan on several big cities.
Who won big?
According to the Youcontrol business search resource, Hertz LLC was established in December 1999 in Odessa. The current address is Jewish street, 2A. Through the firm “Avers,” “Hertz” is managed by residents of Odessa Gennady Besedovsky and Konstantin Tkach. Until July 2022, Dmitry Nikitin from Odessa was considered another main owner. This is the former deputy chairman of the Odessa Regional Council. During his term, Hertz received 2.4% commission on each payment made by Odessa residents for utilities, amounting to UAH 20-30 million per month, according to experts.
Until July 2022, Dmitry Nikitin, the former Deputy Chairman of the Odessa Regional Council, owned Hertz.
As of November 2022, Hertz has also successfully established itself in the utility and municipal services markets in Kyiv, Khmelnitsky, and Lutsk.
In some places, the actions of Odessa residents were turned into criminal cases. The National Police is investigating abuse of official position, which led to severe consequences. Starting from 2020, a number of municipal enterprises in Kiev did not indicate their details in invoices, but instead provided the details of Odessa LLC Hertz Financial Company, according to the criminal case materials.
By the way, from September 1, users will have to pay at least 10 UAH for each receipt using the company's personal account.
Snapshot from the Hertz website
However, in Khmelnitsky, Hertz has a monopoly on the introduction of an electronic ticket in public transport. In 2018, Hertz Financial Company LLC won a competition held by local authorities, where other potential participants were not allowed to compete.
Residents of Odessa have installed fare payment terminals with appropriate software in Khmelnytsky trolleybuses. The utility company “Khmelnitskelectrotrans” gives “Hertz” 6.75% commission from the sold ticket, amounting to UAH 7 to 9 million annually.
An important note: Alexander Malin represented the Odessa “Financial Company Hertz” when it entered the Khmelnitsky market.
Alexander Malin worked as First Deputy Minister of Infrastructure in the government of Arseniy Yatsenyuk after the Revolution of Dignity
This is the former First Deputy Minister of Infrastructure in the government of Arseniy Yatsenyuk after the Revolution of Dignity. It was also reported that Yatsenyuk and Malin have been friends for a long time. In 2009, Malin became a party member of the prime minister and headed the Odessa Front for Change. Under Yanukovych, Malin was vice-chairman of the Odessa Regional State Administration, for which he fell under lustration. The media published information about the cosmic amounts of bribes that Malin allegedly received while supervising the construction sector in the Odessa region.
In 2015, Malin pushed his longtime business partner Dmitry Nikitin to the post of head of Ukrposhta. The same that had a share in Gerka. That is, it could turn out that Ukrposhta and Hertz could take control of the billions of flows? But it didn't work out.
Another non-random coincidence. On the already mentioned Odessa street Evreiskaya, 2A, Odessa City Map LLC is now registered. The head of the organization is Alexander Malin, and among the co-owners are residents of Odessa Nikitin and Tkach and Besedovsky from Hertz.
In addition, the “hertsovtsy” work very fruitfully with the Volhynians. In particular, at the beginning of the Russian aggression, they won a tender worth UAH 1 million, which was held by the subsidiary “Evoda Trade” of the utility company “Lutskvodokanal”. For this money, the contractor maintains a single database of personal accounts of payers, service providers and a debt base; handles information about consumer debts and accruals.
Let him “Hertz”! Who was donated by Naftogaz consumers
What is interesting: the customer and the contractor from Odessa drew up the specified service agreement in a strange way. In the column “Details of the parties”, the contractor and the customer indicate a subsidiary of Lutskvodokanal. But the seal and signature on the part of the performer were put by the then director of Hertz, Dmitry Nikitin. the post of General Director of State Enterprise Ukrposhta, the Ministry of Infrastructure provoked another scandal
Oleksandr Malin. The regions are rushing to the power of the holding companies of the Ministry of Infrastructure
