Platinum Credit has been sued for making loan deductions on a payslip whose owner never applied for a loan with them.
In the case that has been filed at the High Court in Mombasa, prison warden Peter Bokole has said that he neither approached Platinum nor took any loan with them, yet, every month, his salary has been getting hit with loan deductions by the lender.
Ironically, the lender has admitted in court that they have no record of Mr. Bokole taking any loan with them. They then claim that his details were sent to them by the Kenya Prisons Service.
It has however not been cleared why they proceeded to make deductions despite not having any record of Mr. Bokole taking a loan with them.
Bokole has told the court that the deductions started in September 2023 when his payslip showed a deduction of Sh2,031. This deduction was alleged to be an installment for a loan of Sh202,031 that he had allegedly taken at Platinum Credit.
When he presented the complaint to Platinum, the firm claimed that the deduction was an error and that the money would be refunded.
The money was not refunded. On the contrary, another deduction of Sh2,031 was done by the firm from his salary in the following month of October 2023.
READ MORE: Pius Muiru’s Sh960 million property faces auction over defaulted loan
On December 23, 2023, Mr. Bokole sought help from the courts. He applied to have the High Court declare the deductions illegal and unconstitutional. He also requested the court to order the lender to refund all the money they had deducted from his salary.
Mr. Bokole also asked the court to issue a permanent injunction stopping Platinum from using his personal data.
The warden who works at Hola Prison told the court that Platinum Credit Ltd had illegally obtained his personal data including his passport photo, identity card details, salary records, M-Pesa statements, employee number, payslip, and next of kin details without his consent.
On its part, Platinum lodged a preliminary objection claiming that the High Court lacked jurisdiction over the matter. The High Court dismissed this objection.
The firm further claimed that the deductions were erroneous and said that Mr. Bokole should have sued both Platinum and his employer Kenya Prisons. The firm alleged that it had deleted the warden’s data from its systems and refunded the money it had deducted from his salary.
In its ruling, the High Court ordered that the matter proceed to a full hearing.
