The Malta Union of Bank Employees has ordered employees working at HSBC Malta’s wealth management division not to assist customers referred to them from commercial banking after management failed to address what it described to be the discriminatory treatment of a single employee.

The union said that this employee’s right to be included under the same terms and conditions detailed in the agreement covering wealth management employees signed on April 2013 was not being recognised by the bank.

It said that management had been given enough time to come out with a serious and official proposal to address this long-standing issue, but said that nothing has been effectively done by management in the last year.

“MUBE cannot accept a situation whereby management decides to unilaterally ‘downgrade’ an employee especially when the entitlement to the same terms & conditions had been made clear and the employee was also promised the same terms and conditions of the grade by management,” the union said.