A timely reminder....

[DaleGG]

Hi

I was talking to one of my tenants yesterday and the conversation is worth repeating for all of us to learn from....

T "thanks for the gift a few weeks ago, that was a lovely thought"
DGG "you are welcome, I hope that you enjoy... bye the way,how is the property, are you enjoying living there?"
T "yes, we are now, but, a week after we moved in I fell and broke my wrist"
DGG Gulp! "Are you alright now? What happened"
T "oh yes, all fixed. I can't believe how silly I was. I had told the kids not to run on the polished boards in socks as they might slip, and then I did it myself!"
DGG "are the boards too slippery?"
T "no, there was one small part that was, but, its better now..."
DGG "does anything need doing?"
T "No, not at all. I was just stupid..."


It's frightening how simple it is for an accident to happen. This tenant is a lovely lady and has taken personal responsibility for what ahppened, but, what if she had decided to sue....

So, please learn from this what you can.

Dale

 

[Lissy]

If she had decided to sue, I would hope you have excellent public liability cover....

 

[MarkB]

Public Liability (PL) insurance is included in many insurance policies

If she had decided to sue, I would hope you have excellent public liability cover....

The vast majority of home / contents / home and contents insurance policies offered by the major general insurers in Australia have a PL component included in the premium.

$5 or $10 million cover is pretty standard, but you should check your policy for details.

Personally I would not recommend anything under $10 million per property.

My advice would be that $5 m is not enough.

All it would take would be a fall on one of your properties > someone becomes a quad > as owner you're held liable > court awards damages which could include a life-time of 24/7 care > and your $5m starts to look like not much at all.

See what it costs for $10m. I doubt very much that it will double the premium you have to pay as for the insurer the risk is not doubling (the risk increases, but it does not double).

For further information see this thread.



MB

 

[NigelW]

Hi

DGG "are the boards too slippery?"

So, please learn from this what you can.

Dale

Playing devil's advocate here for a minute:

It's a slippery slope from the above question to "maybe the boards are too slippery".

Saying the former is probably okay, just. Saying the later may end up with your insurer denying you cover because you've voided the policy by admitting liability.

Equally, an unfriendly insurer may seek to argue that (had you been aware of the accident) in giving gifts etc you were paying, in kind, or making some contribution towards her medical fees - again voiding your cover. Now this is certainly a v e r y long bow to draw I agree - but insurers are slippery b@#$%ds.

Cheers
N.

 

[Sim]

but insurers are slippery b@#$%ds.

Too slippery ?

 

[NigelW]

Too slippery ?

Almost as slippery as Dale's floor!

When dealing with insurance "incidents" a variation on the old Seargent Schultz routine is in order

"I say NuthingK!"

 

[squash]

Whatever happened to personal responsibility – gee I cracked my head on the cave, wasn’t my fault, who can I blame!

This really gets me going, what is wrong with today’s society? I think that recent threads have hinted at the root problem – personal responsibility / accountability, or lack of it!

Australia, a litigating society, some people need to take a long hard look at themselves – especially those who exploit legal loopholes or semantics of a situation.

 

[djsherly]

Whatever happened to personal responsibility – gee I cracked my head on the cave, wasn’t my fault, who can I blame!

This really gets me going, what is wrong with today’s society? I think that recent threads have hinted at the root problem – personal responsibility / accountability, or lack of it!

Australia, a litigating society, some people need to take a long hard look at themselves – especially those who exploit legal loopholes or semantics of a situation.

I think you'll find that the courts are slowly heading in that direction. Recent cases such as the poor irishman who became a quad after diving into a sandbar show the courts are beginning to accept that people should not abrogate personal responsibility for their actions.

Cheers,

Chris.

 

[Lissy]

It's not only that people don't accept responsibility for their actions - the insurance system "supports" people making claims.
How? Because when a claim is made, they look at it and work out how much it's going to cost them to dispute it, and their chances of being successful. They will then often make an offer of a far reduced payment to the plaintiff to make them piss off.
The result? Law firms that specialise in putting insurance claims in, knowing full well that it's a load of garbage, but that the claimant is likely to walk away with say $10000 for their trouble, and the law firm taking a good slab of it.

 

[geoffw]

This really gets me going, what is wrong with today’s society? I think that recent threads have hinted at the root problem – personal responsibility / accountability, or lack of it!

What is wrong?

I'll take this thread in a little different direction.

Yesterday two 14yo girls were having a (physical) fight at my daughter's school- straight after school, with lots of people around.

The elder sister of one (age 18) said, "That's not the way to fight. I'll show you".

The 18yo proceeded to punch and kick her sister's opponent= face and body- possible broken nose.

There were no teachers present (this was straight after school).

One parent was present, and tried to help the victim. The 18yo pulled a knife.

The victim I believe went to hospital.

Both of the original fighters were suspended (big deal for the victim- she's probably not able to go back to school for a while.

The 18 yo has been charged.

OK, Queanbeyan does have its share of low socio economic as well as race issues (a large immigrant population from one area).

But this fight did not involve any of the groups one might expect.

What's wrong?

.That such a vicious attack occurred in the first place. The instigator wasn't even directly involved.
.There were no teachers present- immediately after school.
.Lots of people were watching. Not one helped (daughter included)
.Daughter's group did not even want to make a statement to anybody

Sorry, just feeling some anger here- I'm a person who likes to express feelings.

 

[Glebe]

People don't help because they've heard so many times that the person that tries to break up the fight is the person that ends up with the stab wounds and the trip to hospital. Shame eh?

 

[phm]

Hi there.

A friend of mine is an experienced high school teacher and she once said that if there was a fight going on between two males, she would go in and stop it but if it was a couple of teenage girls, she wouldn't. So much for the weaker sex!

 

[4GH1RH]

Back to the original post, the message I see there is that if you are nice to your tennants (she obviously liked the gift) then they are less likely to be nasty to their landlord?

Hmmm, is landlord politically correct? Landlady? Landperson?