It’s embarrassing to trip, slip, and fall, especially when you find yourself in a public space full of other people. You’ve seen it in films and television programmes such as You’ve Been Framed, and you can definitely imagine the same thing in real life: you didn’t notice the puddle of water, so you slipped, and everyone around you was looking as if they couldn’t figure out whether to laugh or pity you.
But there’s more to the shame that you should be worried about: injuries. Slips, trips, and falls can lead to serious physical conditions. You can hit your head on the pavement during the fall and lose consciousness, you could fall off a cliff and die (however unlikely it seems it could happen), you can slip on a ice pavement or an object and fracture your hips and hurt your spine.
What Could Being Injured Mean?
One, you can lose your job. Slips and falls in extreme cases can lead to temporary or permanent disability. Either way, you may lose your ability to function well and contribute to the company. The business may have no other option than to let you go. Definitely when you’re seriously hurt, you can land yourself in a hospital for days or even weeks, months if it’s truly severe. You have to spend money on therapy and more medications and check-ups.
These situations can make you lose your confidence and purpose in life. You might not be physically able to provide properly for the family anymore, and whatever opportunities that you could have gained if you hadn’t suffered the accident may be lost forever.
If you find yourself in any of these situations, you’re provided with a remedy. It’s called a claim.
The slip, trip, and fall claim is a kind of general personal injury claim against a third party, the one responsible for the injury. If you win the case, you will be awarded with two types of damages: special and general. The general damages are those that cover the pain and suffering you experience because of the accident while the special damages are more specific, since they relate to the cost of the medications, hospital care, nursing care, and other expenses you have or will incur because of the injury.
Can’t The Insurance Pay You Directly?
A lot of individuals and businesses would try to get away from any claim because it can be tedious and damaging to their reputation, so they would ask to let their insurance company cover the expenses. However, insurance companies can also be cunning when it comes to their dealings, keeping as much money as they can, which is understandable to a degree. So sometimes what compensation you end up with is far less than what you deserve.
Working with a solicitor and filing for a claim should send a signal to the other parties involved that you deserve a better treatment and get the right compensation for all the pain you are going through. Although the money may never be enough, it can take a lot of your worries out of your mind, particularly when it comes to providing income for the family and enhancing your quality of life after the accident.
