Kuwaitiful did such a
wonderful job of listing little-known-rights facts that I am reposting it
here. I've been here 20 years and some of the information he's listed was news
to me.
Here goes....
If
a cop stops your car and asks you to open your car’s trunk to inspect, you can
politely tell him not to proceed until he shows you permission from the “Bublic
Prosecution“.
A
cop approaches you to investigate or arrest you but wasn’t wearing his cop
uniform, do you have to comply? Yes but only if he shows you his identification
card.
If
you were going through financial hardship and wanted to write a check with a
date in the future (to avoid the person cashing the check today) would that be
permissible? No, the bank by law is obliged to cash a check if it is handed to
them.
If
you rented an apartment or a house for 1 year, you are qualified by law to
extend the rent for up to 5 years. The owner cannot kick you out before then.
If
you purchased a used car with a document from a company saying the car is
functional with no problems and the car turns out to have issues you have the
right to go back to that company and demand compensation.
If
you have comprehensive car insurance on your car (the one that covers you
whether the accident was your fault or not) and you make a fake accident
document to cash in, you will face 7 years of jail time.
If
you use a fake fingerprint item to register a co-worker on the attendance
machine you will get fired and face jail time.
In
most cases, you will have to bring your witnesses because no one else will
order them to attend for you and if you don’t you increase your chances of
losing your case.
If
you wanted to lend someone money, if it’s less than KD 5,000, there should be a
witness(es) but if it’s more than KD 5,000 then there must be a written
contract stating you have lent him the amount or else you won’t be able to file
a case against him if he refuses to pay you back.
If
a crime was taking place, and you were standing next to the people doing the
crime while they were doing it then you are considered a partner in that crime
and might face jail time.
If
you work at a bank and you took a loan from that bank, the bank cannot
charge you an interest fee regardless of how large the loan is or how long it
will take you to pay it back.
If
you accuse someone of a crime that wasn’t registered against him/her by
the law, you might face jail time that goes up to 2 years.
Every
person has the right to exchange an item they purchased within 5 days if
the item was damaged. It is against the law to have a store stating an
item cannot be exchanged or refunded.
A
crime can be as simple as throwing water at someone. If someone assaulted you
they can get up to 3 months to 10 years of jail time. If you get physically
harmed go to the hospital first, get proof that you have been assaulted then go
file a case at the police station with proof.
When
you receive a check, you have 4 months to go to a bank and cash in the check
from the day the check was issued. If the issuer of the check had insufficient
funds in his bank account, you can submit a complaint to the prosecution (you
have 4 months to do so, else your submission will be void).
You
have the right to pay your rent fees of where you reside anytime before the
20th of that same month. If you pass the 20th and haven’t paid rent yet the
owner has the right to file for your departure. If you pay before the 20th of
the month and the owner refuses to accept your payment, you should file a
complaint to the government so that he wouldn’t force you to leave the
apartment for good on the basis of not paying your rent fees.
Having a
weapon without an official licence can get you jail time of 5 years. Even just
having ammunition of a weapon without an official licence will get you in jail.
I say having instead of owning because just having a weapon with you will
get you prosecuted, you don’t need to own it.
If
someone physically attacked you (either male or female), you have the right to
attack back to defend yourself. Part of self-defense is not over-exaggerating,
if someone pushes you for example you cannot go and stab him on the basis of
self-defense. If you do so, that will get you prosecuted.
If
you beat someone up and that person dies as a result of his/her wounds but it
was proven you did not have the intention of killing that person, you will face
10 years of jail time.
Sometimes
you rent a place and find something is damaged, it can be in the AC, Elevator
etc (something leaking for example). The owner must pay for fixing what was
damaged, if the owner refuses to pay you can take permission from the
government to fix it and have him pay for it.
If
you own a house and you’re renting part of it while one of the people you’re
renting to is noisy and disrupts other neighbors. You can then as the owner of
the house file a submission to force him to leave for good. You will need in
this situation to have witnesses and they have to be neighbors of
that apartment.
If
you take a photo of someone that does not want you to take of a photo of them,
you will face 2 years of jail time. If you also share their photo with others
or make it available online, then you face 3 years of jail time. This should
make you think twice before taking a photo of someone without their consent.
Any
Kuwaiti that is registered in a company he doesn’t work in to receive the
monthly labor support salary from the government will face up to 7 years of
jail time if caught as well is paying back all the money he
illegally received.
If
you accuse someone of a crime and it later turns out the accuser knew the
accused did not do the crime, then the accuser will face 2 years of jail. I
would guess this also applies when a girl falsely accuses a guy of
rape.
If
a person falsely called the fire department, or the police to report a crime,
or accident and in reality there was no such thing. This person faces 3 years
of jail time plus all expenses endured by the government for his actions.
If
you purchased a car outside Kuwait and went to the local dealership and
they refused to service your car or asked you to open a profile with their
company first and pay a fee, this company has went against the law. You can
then file a complaint against them at the Ministry of Commerce to get your
issue resolved.
There
are some that open a commercial license then rent it to someone else. This is
considered illegal by law.
There’s
a government sector that deals with complaints. Any girl that files a complaint
of someone threatening to make her images public or recorded conversations, she
will be taken seriously and with complete privacy.
It
used to be when you go to a store and bought a product on discount, you
wouldn’t have the right to return it. The rules applied have changed, you can
now exchange the product within 14 days of purchase.
If
you find out at the end of the month that your Telecom provider has billed
you for services you never used or even knew you had, you can file a complaint
at the Consumer Protection sector (call 135).
You
can put ‘No Parking’ signs in your private property but at the same time you
are not allowed to damage or harm any cars that park in your property. Instead,
you let the police deal with it.
Any
restaurant that has a minimum order or has service charges is not permissible
in Kuwait. If you end up dealing with any of the two you can file a complaint
at the Consumer Protection sector (call 135) and if you win the case you can
ask for a refund on the money that you were unjustly charged for.I remember I
was in Fridays once and when we got the check, there was a big service charge
so when we asked them to remove it because it’s not legal they said our lawyers
said it was okay to keep it and we ended up paying for it. This was at least 5
years ago so I can’t remember the exact scenario, what I remember for certain
is they refused to remove the service charge.
If
you have a relative that is addicted to drugs, don’t wait until he gets caught
and jailed for possession of drugs. You can instead file a complaint (for
his/her own good) at the drugs department and they will open a file for him
there and treat him as a sick patient, a case will not be filed against
him.
If
you resign from your job and qualify for end of service benefits while during
your job you used to get a bonus end year salary every year then the end of
service benefits must also include the bonus with your salary.
If
you took your car to the dealership for maintenance. The dealership is obliged
to give you a paper that includes maintenance duration, what will they need to
fix and what are things that will be replaced if any.
Most
car dealerships tell you if you do your maintenance outside their dealership it
will void your warranty. This is incorrect, you can by law do your
maintenance anywhere as long as they abide to using the correct equipment for
maintaining your car
If
you wanted to sue someone don’t do it a while later, you have to file a
lawsuit as soon as possible because every dispute has a limit of days
if passed and you still haven’t sued, then you can’t file for a lawsuit.
Many
think if you curse someone without mentioning their name then that person can’t
sue you for damages. That isn’t true, if you curse someone with information
leading to that person than they can sue you on that basis.
If
you go to a store and give back your product then ask for a refund while the
store says we can’t give you a refund in cash but you can purchase anything
from us with the same amount, that store has gone against a law because they
are forced by law to refund you with cash.
Expensive
items such as diamonds and watches can be returned within 24 hours if on the
receipt it mentions the 24 hour duration. If it doesn’t mention that duration
then you have the right to return the item within 14 days.
Read more: http://kuwaitiful.com/information/know-your-rights-in-kuwait-parts-1-6/#ixzz4EprFDKSi
