Mistakes People Make After Slip And Fall Accidents

If you fall inside a store, or on a business’ premises, it is hard to believe that you can do anything wrong. After all, you are the victim, and are now suffering because of a store’s carelessness. But there are things that people often do, usually innocently, that can hurt their ability to recover damages after they fall inside someone’s property.

Failing to Report the Accident

The first mistake people make is not reporting the accident itself to an employee of the store or property.

This often happens because the injured person may not actually feel that injured after the fall. They may be fine—or maybe they don’t feel fine, but want to “tough it out,” and don’t want to “complain.”

But these are serious mistakes. Remember that in many falls, victims don’t feel pain immediately. They may have an injury that is slow to manifest. Victims go home, wake up the next morning in incredible pain and now they have a problem because they never reported the fall when it originally happened.

Not only will the other side question your version of the facts, but a jury, later on, will wonder how bad your injuries could have been, if they weren’t bad enough to compel you to report the accident when it happened.

Worse, vital evidence has been lost; whatever you fell on is likely cleaned up, fixed, moved or repaired, when you wait to report the accident. Evidence like videotape that records over itself will have been lost

Losing or Destroying Evidence.

Often people will unknowingly destroy evidence they didn’t even know was evidence. For example, you may not even realize the clothes that you wore during the fall are evidence. They may have the substance that you fell on ingrained in their fibers. The other side may want to see if you have blood on the clothes. If you purchased something in the store where you fell, your receipt may even be evidence. If you took photos of the accident scene, or your injuries, or your trip to the hospital afterwards, these are all vital pieces of evidence.

Settling too Quickly

Shortly after your fall, many stores or properties (or their insurance companies) will try to offer you medical help. They may offer to pay your medical expenses. But this is just an attempt to get you to settle your case quickly, and for very little money.

They want you to sign a release that prohibits you from ever making further claims against them, and they want you to do that immediately, without the help of an attorney, and possibly, without even knowing how injured you may be.

The release also likely will not include any compensation for pain, suffering, future lost wages, or future medical care—all things you may be entitled to, had you not quickly settled your case.

Call the Clinton personal injury lawyers at Fox Farley Willis & Burnette, PLLC, today if you were injured in or on someone else’s property.

Source:

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