There Is A Risk When Strangers Walk Into Your Home

Would you let a total stranger into your home? Just unlock the door, and let someone in, with no prior knowledge of who they were, or what their background was? You probably wouldn’t. But in fact, you do this every day, all the time, when you order items to be delivered from online or big box retailers, or when service people enter your home.

False Sense of Safety

When City Furniture or Best Buy or Target or some other major, big box retailer, sends people to your home, you probably have a feeling of safety. After all, these are large companies and they likely only hire reputable, respectable people. They do their homework when it comes to knowing who is doing their deliveries for them.

Or do they? In fact, they may not. What you may not know, is that when these large retailers are making deliveries to your home, and thus putting delivery people inside your home, in many cases, it isn’t the store you bought the item from that’s delivering anything. Many of these large companies contract out to third parties to do their deliveries.

Many of these third party companies are smaller, and whether as a cost cutting measure, or just out of laziness, many don’t do background checks, or bother to see whether the person going into your home could be dangerous.

Tragedy With Best Buy Delivery

In Florida four years ago a woman ordered an appliance from Best Buy. Neighbors later reportedly heard screaming from the home. The delivery person, high on cocaine, had beaten the woman and set her on fire.

Later, when a lawsuit was filed, it was learned that Best Buy had contracted the delivery out to another company, a company which, it was alleged, did not do background checks. The delivery person had a criminal record and a suspended license—all things that, had they been known, should have kept any person from delivering items into a stranger’s home.

Comcast Murders

Comcast also has had incidents, including some recently, when multiple people were murdered by a cable installer supposedly working or Comcast. The victims were strangled and assaulted. Again, even though the delivery people were at the direction of Comcast, it turned out that Comcast had contracted out with a separate company to do installations.

Keeping Yourself Safe

You can always ask a big box retailer whether they use a third party to do installations or deliveries. Use common sense. Try not to be home alone when there is a delivery. Have your phone with you.

Remember that if anything does happen, the company that you bought the item from may still be liable—even if another company was used to do the actual delivery or installation. A company cannot delegate that duty to another, third party company.

Call the Clinton personal injury lawyers at Fox Farley Willis & Burnette, PLLC, today for help if you have been injured by someone who works for a large company, whether accidental or intentional.

Sources:

chicago.suntimes.com/2016/5/4/18392071/former-comcast-worker-guilty-of-killing-second-woman

usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/08/21/florida-man-delivery-best-buy-attacks-woman-sets-her-fire/2070514001/