Employees of Tha Nickolee Hotel in Nanyuki have anonymously come forward with a litany of grievances against the hotel's management, accusing them of unlawfully deducting huge amounts from staff salaries without explanation, while subjecting workers to 15-hour days in a toxic environment where the director allegedly hurls insults and threats of dismissal at employees.
The workers, many of whom are orphans or sole breadwinners for sick parents and siblings, are particularly incensed by what they describe as the operations manager's overbearing conduct, including branding all staff as thieves and lazy, interfering with departmental operations, ganging up with junior staff to undermine managers, and shouting at chefs in the kitchen.
The employees are now demanding immediate intervention from the Nanyuki Labour Office, the Ministry of Labour, and the Kenya Revenue Authority, warning that if management does not cease the intimidation and unauthorized deductions, they will escalate the matter to relevant authorities.
"Dear Nyakundi. Please assist in posting the below and please hide my identity. I do not want to be killed. There is this hotel in Nanyuki called The Nickolee Hotel. Hell of a place. Toxicity at its best. Because why did the management wake up and decide to be deducting staff salaries without a reason? Do they know how hard it is to get that salary? Do they know how hard it is to survive in this Kenya with the taxes we have? We work and spend almost 15 hours a day at the hotel, then the best they can do is deduct very huge amounts of money from our pay. Some of us are orphans, some have sick parents, some have siblings we are educating, yet they have the audacity to deduct our money on top of what Kasongo is deducting from us.We want this to stop or else we will invite the relevant offices to do it on our behalf. WE WANT NANYUKI KUDHEIHA OFFICES TO COME AND ASSIST US, THE MINISTRY OF LABOUR PLUS KRA PEOPLE. It is time the world gets to know what we as staff go through at the so called hotel. We want the issue of the director shouting at us and even insulting us to stop immediately. We want the issue of the director threatening to fire us and telling us we are all fools to stop. The operations manager needs to stop intimidating and threatening managers by saying she will fire us. The issue of the operations manager overstepping and saying that all managers are incompetent needs to stop. She has zero experience in hospitality. SHE NEEDS TO STYLE UP. The issue of the operations manager interfering with the departments and even ganging up with junior staff to say managers are incompetent should stop, and stop immediately. The issue of the operations manager saying that people are stealing from the hotel needs to stop unless she has evidence. We, especially those of us in service, have suffered enough stress from being told we are all thieves. We are not happy with what she does, always walking around yapping that we are all thieves. The issue of the operations manager saying that people are lazy needs to stop. She needs to tell us what she does other than sitting in the camera room the whole day looking for thieves. The issue of the operations manager coming to the kitchen and shouting at chefs needs to stop. She spends all her time at the pastry section gossiping about everyone, including the managers and the directors. This has to stop. The issue of her coming to the club to drink, yap, gossip, shout, and command us needs to stop."