Accessible & Inclusive Environment

Here at Yandex, we believe we can make the world a better, more equal place through our technology. We see ample opportunities for leveraging our innovation and service infrastructure to support those in need, and choose to build a sustained community support model that is inseparable from our business objectives.

About Helping Hand

Yandex’s Helping Hand initiative is the core of our corporate citizenship. Introduced in March 2020 as a COVID-response that aimed at providing free taxi rides to medical and social workers and delivering the necessity goods, the initiative has transformed into an extensive action to create accessible environments. Today, the Helping Hand programs focus on the following:

Increasing mobility for disabled children and adults

Yandex arranges free Yandex Go taxi rides for people with reduced mobility who are beneficiaries of partner non-profit organizations

300,000+

free Yandex Taxi rides for the disabled as of June 2022

Nearly 80,000

partner drivers have joined the program as of June 2022

Engaging community and raising funds for charity through the bill rounding-up feature

By activating the Helping Hand feature in the Yandex Go app, users can round up the total of their orders to the nearest 10, 50, or 100 rubles. The difference is then used to sponsor the Helping Hand’s ongoing programs. The feature is linked to payments for orders from Yandex Taxi, Yandex Eats, Yandex Lavka (e-grocery),Yandex Market and Yandex Fuel

750,000+ people

signed up for the round-up option in Yandex Go as of September 2022, raising RUB 170 million

Building capacity of nonprofits through free access to Yandex’s digital solutions for business

With the access to Yandex’s services for business like Yandex 360 or Yandex Cloud, non-profits can manage their workflow and correspondence or host CRM systems. Yandex covers all the subscription costs

180+ charity funds

have been granted free access to Yandex services for business

Promoting charity through nonprofit advertisement grants for charity funds

Not-for-profit organizations whose ad campaign meets certain criteria (RU) can apply for up to RUB 150,000/month grants (up to RUB 1.8 million/year). Before applying, organizations can take advantage of a free course on effective online advertisement developed by Yandex

230+ organizations

have received grants for non-profit advertising as of September 2022

Providing in-kind support to non-profits

Using funds raised through the bill rounding up initiative as well as its own monthly donations, Yandex sponsors purchases of essential goods from Yandex Market, such as essential food packages, home care products, furniture, rehabilitation and personal hygiene products, pet supplies, and more

During the pandemic

During the peak of the pandemic (between March and September 2020) the Helping Hand organized over 400,000 free Yandex Go rides for 12,000 medical workers in 34 cities, for them to be able to visit as many patients as possible. Free rides were also offered to employees and volunteers of charitable organizations who were in need or commuting to work and hospitals during the lockdown. By the end of September 2020, 65 nonprofits in 104 cities used that option.
We also delivered free food packages and essentials to the elderly, large families and other vulnerable groups in partnership with local authorities and not-for-profit organizations. The total of 56,000 deliveries was made in 58 cities.

Improving the accessibility of services

We aim to develop inclusive services that benefit users, making their lives easier. Yandex believes that a truly inclusive service is accessible to everyone.

Yandex applies the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.2 (WCAG) standard to improve service accessibility for blind users. Over 10 of Yandex's services are already accessible across various platforms and devices.

In 2021, we fully optimized the Yandex Go ride-hailing app, for blind users to easily navigate all the app’s features: they can enter a destination, learn and select a ride fare and payment method, book a ride, and leave comments for the driver.

Useful materials