The court ordered Equity Bank Kenya Ltd to pay three expatriates more than Sh13.8 million for failing to notify them of their dismissal as expected by the law.
This is after the four sued the lender in 2017 saying they were declared redundant against the law.
They also claimed that they were discriminated against on account of being foreigners but the claim was rejected by the court.
They were sacked in 2016 and the board informed them that they had made a decision to terminate the services of industry specialists and were assured it was a strategic decision, even though the company was happy with their performance.
Employment and Labour Relations court judge Anna Mwaure ruled that the bank failed to involve Alan John Roberts, Raphael Devantier, and Gerard Jan Hofhuis before declaring them redundant.
“The court has perused the documents submitted by the respective parties and has not found that there was due notification to the claimants’ Nos 1 to 3 to declare them redundant as required by section 40 (1) (b) of the Employment Act,” the judge said.
She added that the notice given to the labor officer by the Equity Bank was never copied to South Africans.
The judge, however, rejected the plea by Alexander Pavlos, a Canadian, saying he resigned voluntarily in February 2016.
The three argued that the decision took them by surprise considering that the bank was not undertaking any redundancy process at the time, and they had just renewed their work and residency permit.
Equity defended the decision arguing that it was facing low demand for advisory products and that there was a need to restructure Equity Bank Investment Group.
