Some of the 250 City bankers planning to sue Dresdner Kleinwort over £50 million in unpaid bonuses face being made redundant this week.

Scores of Dresdner's London staff will be formally notified by Friday afternoon they are losing their jobs.

Several hundred more will go in two weeks' time when a 90-day consultation period with employees ends.

New parent company Commerzbank announced in December that it would axe about 1500 of the 3000 staff in London.

Around half are understood to have agreed exit packages already.

But the Evening Standard revealed last week that 250 Dresdner staffers had hired law firms Manches and Mishcon de Reya to sue Commerzbank.

The bankers argue their €400 million (£367 million) bonus pot was protected before last autumn's Commerzbank takeover yet the new owner slashed payouts by 90% in January because of the bank's losses.

It is thought some of them could drop plans to sue if they are offered redundancy deals that take account of the unpaid bonuses issue.

Commerzbank declined to comment on whether a pay-off would be affected or delayed if an employee sued.

Legal sources acting for the bankers argue that Dresdner gave an undertaking it would pay the bonuses after pressure from the Financial Services Authority which wanted to guarantee stability.

The law firms are expected to ask Dresdner to hand over correspondence between the bank and the FSA.