Slip and fall injuries are the most common type of injuries. A slip and fall can be harmless or cause a severe injury like breaking your hip. When shopping in a store, you can slip and fall, hurting yourself, in which case you could sue the store. However, you should know that you will have to prove negligence on the store’s part.
The law requires businesses to ensure that their premises are safe for customers. It will also be best to know that the store will have liability insurance, and it is against the insurance company that you will make your claim.
Read on to find out if you can sue the store if you suffer a slip and fall injury while shopping:
Business Responsibility To Maintain Safe Premises
First and foremost, you should understand a legal concept called premises liability. It refers to the duty stores and other businesses having to ensure that their premises are relatively safe for their customers and visitors. If you slip and fall when shopping, the store should have violated their duty, and they will be liable for any injury you sustain on the premises due to the fall.
Establishing the violation will be the basis for suing the store or business for compensation.
To have a personal injury case, there must have been unsafe conditions on the premises, and they should have failed to take the necessary steps to minimize harm to customers and visitors.
Negligence And Harm
The next step will be to establish negligence on the business’ part that led to actual harm to a customer or visitor. The store will only accept premises liability if someone was responsible for the hazard that was overlooked and led to your injury.
It would be best to get legal advice from a specialist lawyer as it is the best way to establish negligence. Personal injury lawyers who are specialists in malpractice and accidents know what to look for, so they are better suited to establishing negligence.
Common causes of slip and fall injuries include
- A liquid substance spilled on the floor
- Tools, furniture, equipment, and other objects are in the wrong places
- Broken tiles, torn carpets, and other floor hazards
- Poor lighting inside stalls
Though the above examples qualify for a slip and fall case, it does not mean that you have a slip and fall claim just because you fall in a store while shopping. You also have to prove that negligence led to harm. You do not have a case if you fell due to the store’s negligence but did not sustain injuries.
Who Do You Sue For A Store Slip And Fall?
You should know who to sue if you slip and fall in a store while shopping. Who you sue will depend on who was negligent and caused your injuries. The accident happened on the business premises, so you may think it is obvious to sue the business or property owner. However, many businesses lease their property, so you will have to sue the owner.
If the business did not know about the issue that caused your injury, for example, the water damage that slips through the floor, you should sue the property owner. On the other hand, if the cause of your injury was something the business owner could have done something about, you should sue the business. An example would be failing to put up warnings about a slippery floor.
Proving negligence is the most critical part of a personal injury case. Regardless of who you sue, you should ensure that you can prove that they could have done something to fix the situation but chose not to do it. The last thing you expect to happen when shopping is falling and hurting yourself. However, the information in this article should help you know if you can sue if it happens.