Vneshposyltorg cheques (previously “certificates” and “vouchers”) were a kind of “parallel currency” that existed in the USSR from 1964 to 1988. They were used to pay wages to Soviet citizens working abroad: primarily specialists employed under USSR construction contracts, as well as specialists (for example, teachers, doctors, and military advisers) working under contracts with foreign state and private institutions (hospitals, universities, etc.), rank-and-file embassy employees, and other persons within the USSR who received fees or transfers in foreign currency.
The main purpose of introducing certificates, and later VPT cheques, was the Soviet state’s desire to limit foreign-currency wage expenditures for citizens working abroad (especially in capitalist countries, where otherwise employees would withdraw their entire salary in foreign currency and spend it locally), as well as to reduce the inflow of privately imported consumer goods from uncontrolled sources. While abroad, part of an overseas worker’s salary in foreign currency was voluntarily (but no more than 60%) transferred to an account at Vnesheconombank; from this account, either on the spot (usually through the economic adviser at the USSR Embassy) or upon returning to the USSR, one could receive a pre-ordered amount in the form of certificates (later, cheques). Some categories of overseas employees of foreign-trade organizations and diplomats were allowed to bring into the USSR a limited amount of foreign currency, which they were required to convert into certificates (cheques) by a fixed deadline; otherwise, their possession of foreign currency was also considered illegal.
Certificates existed in three types: “blue-striped certificates” paid to citizens working in CMEA countries (account crediting ratio 1:1); “yellow-striped certificates” paid to overseas workers in countries with non-convertible currency, i.e., in the Third World, for example India, African countries, etc. (ratio 4.6:1); and “unstriped certificates” paid to those working in countries with freely convertible currency (ratio 4.6:1). Thus, “yellow-striped” and “unstriped” certificates unofficially served as a physical analogue of the notional-account foreign-currency “gold” ruble, performing a quasi-function of “Soviet chervonets.”
Certificates and vouchers (later cheques) could legally be spent exclusively in the chain of special stores, the “Beryozka” shops; in addition, they could be paid in as a contribution to a housing cooperative, but only at a 1:1 rate to the ordinary ruble, which was also an additional revenue item for the state. The essence of the certificate system was that overseas workers in different countries, with formally comparable salary levels (close to the USSR average), in reality received wages with very different purchasing power. For example, the salary of a Soviet interpreter in India, nominally 200 rubles, in fact amounted to 920 rubles in “yellow-striped certificates,” while the salary of an interpreter, for example in Hungary, equal to 400 rubles in “blue-striped certificates,” amounted to the same 400 rubles. In “Beryozka,” blue- and yellow-striped certificates could be used to buy not only clothing, carpets, crystal, and other mass-produced consumer goods from CMEA countries, but also automobiles.
For “unstriped certificates,” higher-quality imported consumer goods were also sold, including Western audio and video equipment and scarce foodstuffs. The difference in the purchasing power of certificates was especially clear from the example of passenger cars:
“Volga” GAZ-21 cost 5,500 rubles in “blue-striped” and only about 1,200 rubles in “unstriped” and “yellow-striped”;
“Moskvich” AZLK-408 cost 4,500 rubles in “blue-striped” and only about 980 rubles in “unstriped” and “yellow-striped”;
“Zaporozhets” ZAZ-966 cost 3,500 rubles in “blue-striped” and only about 760 rubles in “unstriped” and “yellow-striped”.