Negligence resulting in a customer or employee injury can lead to significant legal and financial consequences for a company. The National Safety Council reported that the cost of personal injury lawsuits reached $167 billion in 2021, with over 500,000 car accidents in Florida alone. It’s no surprise then that businesses will take steps to protect themselves from injury lawsuits — even after you’ve been injured by their negligence. We will outline five key actions St. Petersburg businesses will take to protect themselves from liability.
Conduct Thorough Safety Inspections
Business owners’ top priority should be ensuring their business facilities are safe for workers and visitors. Business owners (or their employees) will perform routine safety inspections to identify dangerous conditions that could injure guests or workers, especially in higher-risk environments. They will check for slip, trip, and fall hazards, proper equipment guarding, electrical safety, blocked fire exits or extinguishers, storage hazards, or lack of proper safety railings on stairs/elevators. They may bring in an outside safety consultant initially to identify less obvious hazards. Business owners are supposed to spot and remediate any safety issues quickly. When they don’t, guests and workers suffer the consequences.
Create and Enforce Safety Protocols
Businesses should go beyond just having safe premises and put clear safety protocols and rules in place for staff. They should tailor these for their specific type of business to avoid injuring guests and customers. For example, food service outlets would focus on proper knife handling and preventing kitchen burns, while retail stores may concentrate efforts on preventing boxes from falling from shelves onto patrons during restocking. When businesses fail to have adequate safety protocols, guests and workers are more likely to suffer injuries or harm on the premises.
Get Adequate Insurance Coverage
Even if businesses take all reasonable safety precautions, accidents to guests and workers can still happen. Fortunately, many businesses purchase commercial general liability insurance and other appropriate policies to cover damages stemming from personal injury claims. If you were injured at a business, you will likely seek compensation for your medical bills, lost wages, and other losses from the business’s insurance company, reach out to an experienced team of experienced St. Petersburg personal injury lawyers for help filing a claim against an insurance company.
Invest in Quality Legal Representation
Businesses or insurance companies often have teams of attorneys to defend them in personal injury lawsuits. They will employ vast resources to challenge claims related to workplace accidents, slip and falls, negligent security, or other premises liability incidents. Their goal is to minimize the payout they owe you after an injury, and if possible, pay nothing at all. That’s why it’s so important for you to hire a personal injury attorney to help even the playing field. Your legal representative will protect your right to compensation and help you avoid mistakes that could hurt your claim.
Maintain Detailed Safety Documentation
Comprehensive record-keeping related to safety provides businesses with evidence in the event of a claim. Businesses often carefully track all safety inspections, training, incidents/accidents (including details like photos), and other related information. They may save inspection reports, protocols, training sign-in sheets, and related emails. They may also keep records of preventative actions taken to address risks or hazards and the timeline for when issues were corrected. These actions can certainly help a business defend itself against a personal injury claim, but this evidence can also strengthen your own claim — you may have the right to access such documents in the event of a personal injury lawsuit.
Businesses will take many steps to protect themselves from a personal injury lawsuit. Many of these steps could also benefit you in your injury claim, especially if the business has chosen to purchase liability insurance and keeps thorough safety records. If you’ve been injured at a business, you have rights. Contact an experienced law firm for more information about your legal options.
