Direct Line have warned trampoline owners that they could be faced with a bill of up to £100,000 if a child is injured whilst playing on their property. The insurer has claimed that they frequently settle in and out of court for personal injury compensation claims of over £20,000 as a result of trampoline, bouncy castle or climbing frame accidents.
There has been a significant rise in recent years of both trampoline accidents and also parents calling their lawyers when their children are injured playing on a trampoline at a friend’s house or at a children party.
A recent study indicated that around 11,000 children are taken to accident and emergency units each year as a result of a trampoline or bouncy castle accident, and compensation claims for such accidents can attract between £20,000 – £100,000. Such claims could force many parents to sell their family home to meet such pay-outs where they are not adequately insured.
What is interesting from a legal perspective is the standard of duty of care in such cases. Whilst many parents would assume that children were not properly supervised, which would amount to negligence, research shows that it is often not the case. Research conducted by Direct Line shows that in 4 out of 5 cases children were properly supervised when their accident took place. Spokesman for the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents suggest trampolines said: ‘If you have a lot of people on the trampoline and they crash into each other you can get concussions and some nasty fractures. We also know if you have a safety net, parents tend to get complacent about safety and that’s when you get more horseplay and serious incidents.’
What will be taken into account when assessing duty of care?
Any person who owns a trampoline or who hires or rents a trampoline for an event either in a public or private space owes a duty of care towards those using the equipment. Under this duty of care trampoline enthusiasts are required to:
- Make sure that users of the trampoline they are responsible for are in the requisite physical and mental condition for trampoline use
- Warn or ‘train’ trampoline users appropriately
- Supervise users of the trampoline adequately
- Set up the trampoline in a suitable location
- Have a first aider on location
- Use a safety net
Trampoline owners are also required to observe reasonable foreseeability, which will be determined by the judge but may include things such as children becoming boisterous or play-fighting on the trampoline.
Failure to meet these standards could result in a costly lawsuit, however this standard of duty of care appears to be very restrictive on this who simply want to have a trampoline in their garden for their children to play.
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Have you or someone you know been affected by a trampoline injury? Or as the owner of premises with trampolines, do you need to defend an action against you? Get in touch to ask us more about the relevant laws here.
Trampoline image via flickr