There’s more pain to the staff at Tusker Mattresses Limited, trading as Tuskys Supermarket as the management has decided to effect as slow lay-off system.
“Effective today, All TML staffs (Artemis, Interns TML) shall for a mandatory unpaid leave as follows per month until further notice as follows: TML -12 days per month, Interns-5 days per month and Artemis-12 days per month”, an email stated in part.
The struggling retailer blames its collapsing business to the COVID-19 pandemic yet reports shows that the business was living on borrowed time at least two years before.
Tuskys management has also suspended all pending annual leave.
‘It’s true the famous tusker mattresses is down”
The email continued, ‘In one month you will therefore be working upto to a maximum of 18 per days including weekly offs. All pending annual leaves have been suspended until further notice.All ongoing annual leaves have been cancelled with the last date being today. We shall be working for our normal hour rate,that is; TML-7.5 hours Interns-9 hours Artemis-9 hours…’
In early June, Tuskys entered into a different phase with empty shelves being a common sight at the once fledgeling supermarket.
Complaints started appearing online as more Kenyans began noticing that their favourite products were missing.
‘It’s true the famous tusker mattresses is down”, a source working in management told cnyakundi.com
Branch managers have been asked to share a plan for staff unpaid leave of 14 days per staff in their branches for the month of July 2020 by close of business (COB) yesterday.
How Tuksys fall began
CEO Githua is also accused of hounding out professionals who joined him in the revamped and professional Tuskys management after 2015. It was easy for him to work with the ‘illiterate’ bunch from the family that owned the supermarket chain, other than the Professional Human Resources, Marketing, Operations, Communications and ICT who would easily call him out for his fraudulent and wayward behavior.
With the exit of the professionals, Dan was left to rule with fiat. He would exploit the lack of proper systems at Tuskys, where frequent reports of orders not being fully delivered or supplies not matching what was ordered soon became he a normal occurrence. It is reported that, a common report there is a instance when almost half the ordered stock disappeared with the suppliers insisting that they delivered the order while the chain disputing that.
Employees also faked robberies and theft to hide pilferage.
A few months back, Tuskys introduced a ‘anti-theft mechanism’, where it blamed and penalized the intern-filled staff of theft and ordered them that if anything is stolen from their branch, everyone’s salary would be cut to recover the stolen item.
“Reference is made to the Tuskys Daily Stock Reconciliation Policy. In reference to the policy, all losses declared everyday should be attached to an individual responsible for the particular stock. As earlier communicated, the company shall also be deducting any loss from the staff involve, Kindly print all daily losses and have staff sign against the losses per section (similar to the procedure for daily cashier variances). Also, have the same variance posted on the notice boards everyday with names”, the internal memo sent in January 2020 stated
As Tuskys, teeters on the brink of collapse, closing some few branches over blaming the decision on low numbers occasioned by Covid-19 pandemic, jittery suppliers have called on the govt to help; fearing that the worse would happen like it did with Nakumatt.
The troubles began early, but only noticeable now in 2020 after covid-19 stroke.
In November, one of the supermarket’s suppliers stated that they went bankrupt and their business was being auctioned for lack of servicing their loan at Family Bank, because Tuskys had delayed with payments.
He had sought audience with the owner of Tuskys, over payments for supplies made, but it was futile. He sent the following to one of the local blogs:
This is to regrettably inform you that the last bit of our company has been auctioned by family bank this morning and so far I have nothing more to lose. You have refused to respond to any of our communications and remained non-committal to our payments since the last time over a month ago when your Mr. Leonard Mupalia informed us that all our pending documents were submitted to the GM for final approval. I regret very much this is happening’.
The govt, through the ministry of Industrialization CS Betty Maina has put the Joram Kamau – founded supermarket under watch.
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