Pennsylvania may not be a tourist hotspot – unlike Florida and California – yet you may still have a hard time booking a vacant hotel room in Pittsburgh or elsewhere across the state.
After you have managed to book a hotel room and have successfully checked into a hotel, you are probably thinking to yourself, “Finally! Now I am going to have all the fun!” But instead of fun, you get months or years of medical procedures, expensive treatments, and lengthy rehabilitation. Unfortunately, hotel accidents are not as rare as we want them to be.
A hotel accident can turn your vacation or business trip into a nightmare instantly, which is why we invited our Pittsburgh hotel accident attorney from Shenderovich, Shenderovich & Fishman to explain who can be held accountable for your injury in a hotel.
HOW A HOTEL ACCIDENT ATTORNEY CAN HELP YOU
Sure, the first thing you will do after getting injured in a hotel speaks to the hotel’s manager. And that’s where you will most certainly encounter your first challenge. The manager will either attempt to shift the blame for the accident onto you or give you the phone number of the hotel’s insurance company, which… will attempt to do the same thing.
Hotels are notorious for trying to escape liability in the event of hotel accidents, which is why having an experienced hotel accident lawyer by your side is often the only viable way to prove that you did nothing to cause the accident and establish that the hotel should compensate for your expenses, losses, and damages due to its negligence, carelessness, and failure to ensure that safety measures are in place.
HOW TO HOLD THE HOTEL ACCOUNTABLE FOR YOUR INJURY
When filing a personal injury claim against a hotel in Pennsylvania, there are a few elements of your claim that must be established through sufficient and convincing evidence to seek compensation:
- The hotel owed you a duty of care (since you were a guest lawfully on the hotel’s property, you will have no problem with establishing this element of the claim)
- The hotel breached the duty of care by failing to protect you from harm (you will have to prove that the hotel was aware or should have been aware of a hazardous condition that caused your injury and that it failed to fix the condition in a timely manner)
- Your injury was caused by the hotel’s breach of duty or its breach of duty contributed to the hotel accident and
- You suffered damages or losses are a result of your injury
Holding a hotel accountable can be tricky because proving that the hotel was negligent usually means that you will have to seek legal advice from a skilled hotel accident attorney in Pittsburgh.
HOTELS’ DUTY TO EXERCISE REASONABLE CARE
Under Pennsylvania’s premises liability law, hotels have a duty to exercise reasonable care to protect their guests. “What does reasonable care mean?” you may wonder. Let us explain. In Pennsylvania, hotels have quite a few duties, including but not limited to:
- Keeping its property in a safe condition and free of any hazards
- Maintaining adequate security to prevent criminal activity
- Maintaining the premises in a way that eliminates the risk of slip and fall accidents
- Maintaining the locks on hotel rooms to prevent theft, assaults, and rape in the hotel
- Ensuing guests’ safety in swimming pools
- Properly inspecting and maintaining the hallways, stairs, elevators, escalators, and other machines and electronics in the hotel
- Maintaining adequate lighting in all common areas at all times
- Properly training hotel employees
- Controlling an insect infestation, such as bed bugs and
- Exercising a high standard of care in the hotel’s restaurant or kitchen to prevent food poisoning
Under Pennsylvania’s vicarious liability law, hotels are liable for the negligence of their employees as long as the negligent act or omission to act occurs in the course of hotel staff’s employment. If your personal injury claim against a hotel succeeds, you may be able to seek compensation for medical bills, loss of income, pain, and suffering, and other damages.
Speak to our Pittsburgh hotel accident lawyers at Shenderovich, Shenderovich & Fishman to discuss your case. Call our offices at (412) 391-7610 to get a free case evaluation.
