Any business that receives customers or visitors into its premises is bound to budget for personal injury lawsuits by using precautions like insurance. That is often considered as the cost of doing business.
It is the responsibility of a business to ensure that its premises are reasonably safe for customers. If a business neglects that duty and a customer gets injured, the customer can sue the company.
Elements Of A Personal Injury Lawsuit
A typical negligence claim against a business must contain three important elements.
● A duty of care - this one is owed to the customer by the business
● A breach of that duty of care
● The breach caused an accident
● The accident caused harm to the customer
A personal injury lawsuit can only prevail if the customer can prove all the above elements.
How To Prove Duty Of Care
Even for a business, it is impossible to prevent all possible accidents. However, reasonable state standards are set and imposed by courts to ensure business owners keep their premises as safe as possible. Some of these standards include:
● Regular inspections of the premises
● Wet floor warnings when cleaning
● Repair of damaged areas like pavements that could cause accidents
When an accident occurs, resulting in personal injury on a customer, the customer’s defense team needs to get the testimony of an expert in safety standards in that particular industry. The expert will testify to the standards expected in that specific context, therefore proving duty of care.
How To Prove Breach Of Duty
Once you have proved duty of care, the next piece of the puzzle is to establish a breach of that duty by the said business. For example, if a customer's injury resulted from a slip and fall on a wet floor with no warning sign, the company has breached its duty to create a safe environment for its customers.
Lawsuits have to be specific on the violations committed. In the above case, the business will have breached the wet floor warning sign duty of care that led to the accident. Proving a breach is therefore dependent on establishing the correct duty of care.
How To Prove Harm Caused By The Breach
There is no case if a customer cannot prove that the breach of duty by the business caused them harm. In a lawsuit, harm takes many forms, including medical bills, loss of money, pain, and suffering, or a disruption to your usual way of life.
A customer who is suing a business for personal injury should clearly show the company’s fault in what happened. However, it is not enough to prove duty of care and breach of duty. For a claim to be valid, the accident must be directly caused by the said breach of duty.
For example, if the customer had worn bulky shoes that made it hard to walk on any surface and tripped, whether the store had wet floors and no warning won't matter. However, if the customer’s shoes were to fail, the customer could have suffered the same fate even if the floors were dry. In such a case, the business may not be liable for the injury.
Conclusion
Personal injury claims are tricky when you do not find your way around them. However, with the proper representation, any case can turn out in your favor. You can click here for more information on personal injury lawsuits.
