Premises Liability Lawyers Edmonton

No one should sustain injuries while lawfully visiting someone else’s premises. And yet, each year, many Edmonton residents are seriously injured while conducting routine activities, like shopping in grocery stores, returning to their vehicles in parking lots, or visiting friends’ places of residence.

According to the province’s Occupiers’ Liability Act, a property’s “occupier” is required to take preventative precautions to ensure that no one visiting their premises will be injured in an accident. This legislation defines the term “occupier” as someone who:

• Owns the property in question
• Is responsible for the condition of the premises (e.g., property manager, superintendent, etc.)
• Controls access to the property
• Oversees for the activities conducted on the premises

If you are in an accident causing you injuries on property owned and/or operated by another party, it may be because of the occupier’s negligence. Occupiers are required by law to fulfill a duty of care to their visitors. By failing to take necessary, preventative, safety precautions, the occupier may be considered negligent. Therefore, they may be responsible for providing you, as a victim of an accident on their premises, with compensation.

For example, if an occupier is aware of a dangerous maintenance hazard on their premises (or should know about it) and fails to address it in a timely fashion or provide you with adequate warnings about it, their negligence could be responsible to you for an injury-causing accident on-site. These negligent occupiers may be liable to you for damages.

Many potentially dangerous maintenance hazards seem commonplace and innocuous on the surface but can lead to severe injuries if not properly addressed. For example, if those responsible for the premises fail to clear ice or snow that has accumulated, and you are injured as a result, they may be responsible by law to compensate you for your injuries. Alberta has the nation’s second-highest rate of hospitalizations caused by ice and snow-related accidents.

If you have been injured in an accident on someone else’s property, our Edmonton premises liability lawyers are ready to help you. We provide free consultations without any obligations. Call one of our legal team today to see if we can help you with your claim.

Type of Premises liability accidents

Our Edmonton premises liability lawyers are committed to helping members of the local community who were injured as the result of a property owner/occupier’s negligence. Our lawyers have experience helping community members who have been injured in a range of circumstances, including:

• Slip and fall accidents
• Trip and fall accidents
• Accidents caused by improperly cleared ice and/or snow
• Maintenance hazards that have not been adequately addressed
• Lack of security personnel on-site
• Escalator or elevator malfunctions
• Schoolyard accidents
• Amusement park accidents
• Swimming pool accidents
• Unaddressed fire hazards
• Improperly cleared fire exits
• Lack of fire safety protocol
• And more

If you or a loved one have sustained serious injuries on someone else’s property, contact us for legal help today.

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Tell Us What Happened

We are here to help Albertans get the compensation and benefits they deserve after being injured in an accident. We take this responsibility very seriously. Book your free call with our personal injury lawyers today and let us help you.

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1-888-494-7191

What does the legal process look like for individuals injured on other people’s property in Edmonton?

The legal process can be complex and daunting. If you have been injured on someone else’s property, then you may be struggling with going to treatment, paying bills, and keeping your life from falling apart. You may not have the time or energy to think about what the legal process looks like. We can help. Our experienced premises liability lawyers serving Edmonton can take care of the legal side of your case, so you can focus on the most important part: getting better.

The legal process involves first identifying whether there is a claim at law arising from your accident and injuries. The law contains general rules and principles that are then applied to specific situations. Each situation is different. It is hard to know definitively whether you have a claim that will ultimately be successful. We look at the full facts of the situation and can provide an opinion on the likelihood of success if you were to start a claim.

We look at things like what caused you to fall. Sometimes the injured person does not know why they fell. If the hazard is unknown the case may be difficult to prosecute successfully. If you slipped and fell on ice or debris, or tripped and fell on stairs or a curb, the hazard should be obvious to you. If you are injured in a more exotic setting, such as in an amusement park ride or waterslide, identifying the hazard can be tricky. Sometimes it takes an expert to inspect the area to come to a conclusion on what the hazard was. We then consider whether the hazard was an unusual hazard, or an ordinary hazard. Stairs are an example of an ordinary hazard. We know they are hazardous and can hurt people who fall down them, but they are a normal and expected part of everyday life. People who have ordinary hazards on their property are expected to take reasonable steps to prevent people from being injured, such as putting a handrail on their stairs. But they are not required to remove the hazard. Unusual hazards are not supposed to be on the premises. That can include things like snow and ice in a parking lot, produce on the floor of a grocery store, or water or other slippery substances on walking surfaces. Occupiers must take positive steps to ensure their property is free of unusual hazards.

Once we have identified the hazard, we compare what the owner did to protect you from the hazard, and compare that to the standard of care, or what they were supposed to do. For usual hazards, like stairs, we might check to see if the stairs were built to code. For unusual hazards, such as snow and ice, we might check to see what system of maintenance and inspection the property owner had in place at the time of the accident, and whether that system was being followed.

We also must identify who was responsible for the property. This might be the legal owner who is on title, but not always. A commercial landlord may lease out the property to a business. The responsibility for making sure things are safe for visitors like you can fall to the owner or the business with the lease. Or the responsibility can be split. In some cases, a property management company is hired to take on the responsibility. In other cases, independent contractors take on responsibilities for certain parts of the property management, like snow removal or janitorial work. Identifying the potentially responsible parties can be complex. Our Edmonton premises liability lawyers have experience in knowing what to look for in identifying the party responsible. After the responsible parties are identified, we can start a lawsuit on your behalf in the Alberta Court of King’s Bench.

What types of damages are available for individuals injured on other people’s property?

If you are injured in a premises liability accident in the Edmonton area, our lawyers may be able to obtain compensation from those responsible for your injuries. Whether we can obtain compensation depends on the strength of your liability case. The amount of your compensation depends on the strength of your quantum case.

Quantum means amount. A personal injury case is divided into a liability component and a quantum component. The quantum of your personal injury claim is the sum of the heads of damage to which you are entitled. Each head of damage is assessed a value.

There are various heads of damage that arise in premises liability accident cases in the Edmonton area. The most common types are set out below.

Non-pecuniary damages are a type of damage that relates to the non-monetary losses you have suffered. They are also known as pain and suffering damages and are meant to compensate you for the nature of your injuries, the severity and duration of your pain, disability, emotional suffering, loss of impairment of life, impairment of family, marital and social relationships, impairment of physical and mental abilities, and loss of lifestyle.

Wage loss is another type of damage commonly claimed in premises liability accident cases. Whether you have suffered a wage loss depends on what your situation was at the time of the accident. If you are young, in school, and have not yet started your career, your wage loss analysis will be different than if you have worked the same job for the last 30 years. Wage loss can be broken up into two components. Past Wage Loss refers to the lost wages up to the time of settlement or trial. Future Wage Loss refers to the lost wages that will be incurred in the future. Any past wage loss analysis – whether past or future – depends on an assessment of what would have happened if the accident did not occur. So, for example, if you are a young person in school with the dream of being a firefighter and you have suffered injuries, the wage loss claim will involve assessing whether you would have been a firefighter had the accident not occurred and whether you will still be a firefighter with your injuries.

Special damages are a type of damage that relates to your out-of-pocket expenses. These expenses can be for things like medication, treatment, mileage, medical aids, mobility aids and other things. In extreme cases it can include modifications to your home or vehicle to accommodate your injured state.

Cost of future care is a type of damage that relates to out-of-pocket expenses not yet incurred. If you are injured in a premises liability accident in the Edmonton area, you may have trouble affording all the treatment you need. Big ticket items like home modifications or expensive mobility scooters may be out of reach financially until after a settlement or judgment. The cost of future care claim allows us to project what your future care expenses will be in the future.

Loss of housekeeping capacity is a type of damage that relates to your ability to care for your home and property. This head of damage is not available in all cases. If you experience pain and suffering while performing household tasks, your loss of housekeeping capacity might be considered as a part of your non-pecuniary damage claim rather than a separate head of damage. If you cannot do your housekeeping tasks and have to hire outside help, then a court might consider that a special damage or a loss of housekeeping capacity, or both, depending on the facts. Loss of housekeeping capacity also has a future component.

In-trust claims are available in cases where friends or family have gone beyond the call of duty to help you with personal care or housekeeping because of your accident. These claims tend to be modest because the courts and society expect our friends and family to assist us in times of need without the expectation of compensation. However, if the services provided by your friends and family are significant and prolonged, we can claim this head of damage.

Book a Free Consultation With Our Edmonton Premises Liability Lawyers

Our lawyers offer a free initial consultation to all prospective clients. Additionally, at Preszler Injury Lawyers, we work on a contingency-fee basis, which means our clients do not pay us for our services unless we win their cases.

Do not hesitate. Get in touch with our legal team today to receive personalized legal feedback on your case during a free initial consultation. You can use this opportunity to ask us any questions you may have and go over the facts concerning your case. This consultation is totally free. Let us put our experience to work for you.

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INJURED ON UNSAFE PROPERTY IN EDMONTON?