A Chilean labor court has ruled that it has no jurisdiction on Banco de Chile's claim which seeks to overrule the resolution of minimum services issued by the country's labor directorate, or DT, La Tercera reported.

The DT's ruling allows the bank to have a minimum of 1,023 employees, or equivalent to 9% of the total workforce, in case of a strike. Both Banco de Chile and the banking superintendent, Eric Parrado, deemed the number as "insufficient."

According to the 2nd Labor Court of Santiago, the country's labor code indicates that in the case of the qualification of minimum services, non-agreement between the parties should be resolved by administrative means, upon request, by the regional DT. A subsection of the law also says that the resolution should only be claimed before the national director of labor.

"This court does not have competence to know the deduced claim, since it was given to the knowledge of the administrative authority, not establishing by the legislator competence for the labor courts, since the claims that proceed against resolutions of administrative authority in labor matters, in this specific case of collective bargaining, was settled only in the administrative instance," the court said.

Banco de Chile said it is evaluating other legal options, including possibly passing the case to the Court of Appeals.