The story of the company which, for sanctions against Russia, were blocked 300,000 euros without knowing why
“It’s been two months since Banca Nazionale del Lavoro of Rome retains, without giving any explanation, 196,000 euro of a contract we made with a Russian client before the outbreak of the war. And for twenty more days 98,000 always from the same customer. And all this I learned from my client, because the Bank did not even inform me of the fact. Now I will call them and invite them to manage my company’s salary, contribution, supplier and bill payments for them. We have been managing everything with our own finance for months without asking the banks for a cent and what do they do? they also take my money, earned thanks to our efforts and without asking the banks for a euro. ” To let off steam is Marco Timossi, CEO of Turla rfk, a company from Paderno Franciacorta in the Brescia area, which builds industrial plants for extrusion all over the world aluminum.
He made in December 2021 two important orders with two different companies, one in Belarus and one in Russia, for several million euros. Now the outbreak of the war has put the company in front of the hallucinating bureaucracy linked to the sanctions imposed by the international community on Putin’s Russia. The National Bank of Labor would have withheld these sums of the company, as an intermediary for this type of operations through a foreign bank branch (in this case the Austrian branch of Commerzbank), for unspecified investigations on the origin and legitimacy of the sums, according to what the press office of the Bank we interviewed tells us. “ We are carrying out the normal checks that all institutes do, like ours, which at this juncture we operate as an intermediary between a foreign institution and the customer’s Italian bank. All this is clear is done to protect customers in the first place. Certainly the times in this case were a bit long, but it does not depend on us, it is the normal bureaucratic procedures that require their own time. ”
CLICK HERE TO READ THE NOTICE ISSUED BY BNL AND BANCA VALSABBINA
The problem is that these times required by the bureaucracy (almost two months) clash with those of the management of a company like Turla rfk, which has to pay suppliers, employees, contributions, bills, expenses that certainly cannot wait for the bureaucratic delays of the Bank, especially in a complicated situation from the point of economic view like the current one. “My client tried in every way to facilitate my task, but in the end he too had to give up, and his transfer, after passing through an Austrian bank, stopped at the Rome office of the National Bank of Work, with which we don’t even work, among other things. “The strange fact that beyond the assurances made by the National Bank of Labor, the prolonged freezing of money (55 days) was done without giving any justification or explanation, despite the fact that ‘company has used all possible channels to get information on the matter.
The CEO of Turla rfk has taken all possible steps to prove that that money came from a regular contract signed well before the conflict broke out and that it was part of a first payment of the order, which they are trying to complete with great difficulty. But his attempts have collided with the usual rubber wall, which the Italian bureaucracy erects in these cases, risking, in an already very difficult moment for companies, to put in serious difficulty a healthy company that works with the whole world and which has its addiction 50 employees. The Valsabbina bank, where Turla rfk had domiciled the payment of these bills from Russia, claims that it cannot do anything, having not even been informed of the blocking of these funds. “Should those at the Bank explain to us what rule or law they used to withhold Turla Rfk’s money? because I haven’t found one. If there is something irregular that they inform the judiciary, at least so we can assert our reasons in front of them and take the appropriate countermeasures. But so it is an embezzlement “says the company’s lawyer, who shows a letter from the Bank of Italy, which, informed by Turla’s lawyers of the unfortunate affair, orders the bank to provide explanations for this inexplicable block .
CLICK HERE TO READ THE LETTER FROM BANKITALIA
This fact, in itself sensational, demonstrates once again how the sanctions imposed on Putin’s Russia have had the effect of hitting Italian companies, which work with Russia, and have done little more than the tickle of Russia. A recent article by Ispi, Institutes for international studies, denotes how only the 19% of the world states (although representing 59% of world GDP) had joined the program of sanctions imposed on Russia. And the accusations of the ISPI also concerned the ineffectiveness of these same sanctions: only a third of the economic sanctions imposed in history have achieved their objectives. In particular, the effectiveness of the sanctions depends on the fact that they are not only strong, but also imposed in unison by most of the nations of the world, in order to reduce the possibility of loopholes and games of laughter. ” Furthermore, as the piece pointed out, the income of the Russia, precisely because of the conflict and the increase in raw materials, would have even increased compared to a year ago (15 billion dollars last April against 10 in April 2021). The most penalized region is precisely Lombardy, where Turla rfk is based, which represents the 28% of Italian exports to the Russian state and 18% of trade.
“There are dozens of companies here in the Brescia area and throughout Lombardy that complain of enormous difficulties in being able to work normally with Russia. It is absurd that we owe the highest price for a war that politicians have failed to avoid. We do not ask anyone anything just to be able to work and not to put a spoke in the wheel. It is unthinkable that without any justification a bank blocks the money that a company has legitimately earned, no one knows yet for what hidden reasons. That’s enough now, In France, Spain and Germany fyear of everything to help businesses, here we almost seem to be a nuisance. We are the productive part of this country, but for us to go on under these conditions becomes more and more complicated every day “He concludes discouraged Timossi. As a last joke three days ago the BNL saw good to send the money back to the sender, who incredulously informed Turla Rfk, which is now evaluating what further measures to take to protect its interests and recover the sums honestly earned and which it does not yet have access to.
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