The High Court has ordered Platinum Credit Limited to preserve its customer and marketing records as it considers a case challenging how personal data is collected, used and handled by the digital lender.
Justice Patricia Nyaundi Mande has certified the case as urgent, allowing it to be heard during the ongoing court vacation.
The orders mean Platinum Credit must keep records that could be important to the case and cannot delete, alter or destroy them as the legal battle continues.
The records include agreements with sales and marketing agents, information on where customer data is obtained, records showing whether customers gave consent to be contacted, as well as call logs, SMSes, emails and other direct marketing communications.
The company has also been ordered to preserve customer complaints and how they were handled, correspondence with regulators, records on how sales agents are recruited and supervised, as well as data protection policies, training and audit records.
The case has been filed by Francis Awino, who says there are concerns about the way personal information is processed and used in digital lending and marketing.
In his application, Awino says some of the records could easily disappear through routine deletion or because of data retention periods.
He is therefore asking the court to ensure the information remains available while his petition is considered.
Awino says his case raises important questions about the constitutional right to privacy, consumer protection and fair administrative action.
“The matters intended to be placed before the Court are urgent, continuing and of public importance,” Awino says in the application.
He also claims that a complaint lodged with the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner resulted in a finding that Platinum Credit’s Independent Sales Agent Agreement did not comply with Regulation 24 of the Data Protection (General) Regulations, 2021.
However, the court has not made a final determination on these allegations.
Awino is not asking the court to shut down Platinum Credit or suspend its licence. Instead, he wants the records preserved so that they can be available when the substantive case is heard.
“The Application doesn’t seek to obtain substantive final relief ex-parte,” the application states.
The High Court has ordered Awino to serve the petition and application on the respondents by August 27.
The respondents will then have seven days to respond, after which Awino will have another seven days to file a further affidavit.
The case will return to court on September 28 before Justice Mutai to confirm whether the parties have complied with the orders and to give further directions.
The interim orders will remain in force until then.
