What Responsibilities Do Business Owners Have?

Anyone who owns or possesses property has the responsibility to maintain it in a safe manner for those who visit.  If anyone suffers a slip and fall injury on someone’s property due to the owner’s negligence, the owner/possessor can be charged with premise liability and face a slip and fall injury lawsuit.  Premise liability is merely a slip and fall injury that occurs on someone else’s premises or property.   For business property, the responsibility of the owner/possessor is even greater.  If there are often customers, employees, or business associates on site, there is a higher likelihood that if there is damage or a dangerous consistency, someone may suffer a slip and fall injury and charge the owner with premise liability. 

Premise Liability Claims
Not every slip and fall injury is the fault of the owner/possessor of the property.  A simple slip and fall injury can come from carelessness or inattention.   However, if the injured party hires a premise liability lawyer and pursues a premise liability claim, a property owner/possessor must be able to show that they maintained the property in a reasonable manner.  “Reasonable” can be difficult to define, especially at the hands of a premise liability lawyer during a slip and fall injury lawsuit.  Nevertheless, common sense generally leads to the truth.

An experienced lawyer can build a case for premise liability after a slip and fall injury for many reasons.  Loose carpeting, a wet floor, poor lighting, cracked sidewalks, slippery steps, uneven flooring, obstacles, spills, and many other forms of damage or inconsistency can be grounds for premise liability.  If the victim has notes, pictures, eyewitnesses, or evidence that the damage or danger had been known or reported earlier, the premise liability lawyer may proceed with his premise liability suit.

Premise liability is often determined according to three criteria:

• If the owner/possessor of the property caused the damage or inconsistency that led to the slip and fall injury, an injury lawyer may have grounds for a premise liability claim.
• If the owner/possessor knew of the damage or inconsistency that led to the slip and fall injury and failed to repair or correct it, an injury lawyer may have grounds for filing a premise liability claim.
• If the damage or inconsistency that caused the slip and fall injury existed for a period of time during which the owner/possessor of the property should reasonably have noticed and repaired it, an injury lawyer may have grounds to file a premise liability lawsuit.

Time can be an important component for a lawyer to prove premise liability in a slip and fall injury lawsuit.  If a spill just occurred and a customer suffered a slip and fall injury before the owner/possessor had time to clean it up, a premise liability lawyer generally cannot prove premise liability.  The courts determination of “reasonable”, in terms of time and diligence, will help decide a slip and fall injury claim. 

In addition to the time element, reasonable awareness is an important component that a lawyer must consider when filing a premise liability claim.  If the victim of a slip and fall injury did not exercise reasonable awareness of the conditions when their slip and fall injury occurred, a lawyer may advise them not to pursue their premise liability case.  Again, common sense often guides decisions concerning slip and fall injury claims.  No matter how effectively a  lawyer presents their case, if the victim of the slip and fall injury did not exercise reasonable awareness, a premise liability lawyer will not win their premise liability lawsuit.

Pursing Premise Liability Claims

If a slip and fall injury warrants a premise liability claim, a premise liability lawyer often begins by negotiating with the owner/possessor and the respective insurance companies.  Most premise liability claims are settled by premise liability lawyer in this way.  Either the owner/possessor of the property is determined to have premise liability, or it is agreed that there is comparative negligence and costs of the slip and fall injury are divided.  If the premise liability lawyer is not successful at this level, the premise liability lawyer may ask a mediator to help.  If that fails, the premise liability lawyer may have to take a slip and fall injury lawsuit to court.  At that point, it is up to the premise liability lawyer to prove that the owner/possessor is guilty of premise liability.