There’s a simple command in business that injury lawyers and other related professionals tend to know about, but business owners and local business leaders too often ignore. It can be summed up in three words — walk the premises.
There are a lot of different situations governing how businesses are run in Charlottesville and around the central Virginia area. As Charlottesville is not a major metropolitan area, many business owners are absentee owners who pay others for the day-to-day work of supervising business operations. In some cases, business owners may be disabled, or simply distracted from their properties by other priorities.
For example, businesses may be run by committee of a number of family members who passively trust each other to perform day-to-day work. Or, in many cases, business leaders just may not take their job as leaders extremely seriously, with the perspective that they should be able to basically set up a business and let it run itself.
Premises Liability – Existing and Obvious Hazards
When business owners do walk the premises, they find occasional problems. There may be running water that’s making a floor wet. There may be loose insulation or other materials intruding into a walkway or access area. There may be old rusty metal or jagged objects in public spaces. Unattended junk or garbage may be in places where it’s accessible to children.
This is just a short list of possible problems that are easily solved when someone with responsibility comes out and walks the property. But when a manager stays in an office, when an owner stays off the premises or when the buck doesn’t stop at anyone’s desk, these problems can keep on being problems until someone gets hurt.
Consultants, Auditors and Lawyers
It often takes an outside set of eyes to come in and point out specific and obvious safety hazards at a business location. One of the most common examples is detailed in the spate of new television reality shows where experts come into a business to see why it’s failing and encounter serious safety problems that no one has fixed.
But this isn’t the only scenario where outsiders are going to determine what happens to your business when something goes wrong. All too often, it’s an injury lawyer who ends up being that outside voice and that objective set of eyes when someone was injured on a business property.
Injury attorneys are trained to spot evidence of premises liability. They have a detailed understanding of federal, state and local law, as well as the ways that ordinances or other rules govern safety in their communities. Where many people have an innate understanding of safety standards, these injury lawyers have a clear and tactical understanding of what generates liability.
Business owners shouldn’t wait for someone else to fix the problem. They should step up and walk the premises, if not every day, then once or twice a week. And if they have questions, they should seek out prior legal advice, rather than just ignoring issues and waiting for something bad to happen.
Seek Help From a Virginia Injury Law Firm Today
Charlottesville, Virginia residents injured in a traffic accident or other public accident, such as a premises liability accident, can call the lawyers at MartinWren, P.C. We have experience representing local families and helping injury victims to get equitable resolutions for their cases.
Call 434-817-3100 or complete a Case Evaluation form
