Premises Liability for Invitees

Premises liability dictates what a property owner or tenant must do to protect visitors from injury. The extent of action required and the amount of liability depends on the visitor’s status. One potential status for a visitor is to be an “Invitee”.

Invitee Defined

An invitee is someone that the property owner or tenant has invited onto the property for the commercial benefit of the possessor of the property. He or she would not be on the property but for the invitation, and the invitation is solely business related. Examples of this are a water-meter reader and a pest control individual.

Liability to an Invitee

A property owner or tenant owes an extremely high duty of care to an invitee. This is because the invitee is entering the property at the express wish of the owner or tenant, and in that invitation it is implied that the premises is safe.

This liability extends so far to require the owner or tenant to warn invitees of unreasonable risks, inspect the property on a regular basis to check for risks and to even fix those risks where possible. Essentially, the owner or tenant must be knowledgeable about the property prior to inviting individual onto it and subsequently becoming injured. The best example of this is a grocery store’s duty to periodically check its floors to make sure that no foods have fallen and present a fall hazard to shoppers.

Reasonable Risks Excluded

The law excludes reasonable risks from the purview of liability to an invitee. A reasonable risk is one that could befall an individual despite precautions and warnings. For example, it is possible for any person to fall down a staircase that is in good working order. In this situation, the owner or tenant would have no liability.

Get Legal Help

If you have questions about an injury occurring on your or another individual’s property, consult an attorney about your rights. An attorney will analyze the status of the injured party and whether the property owner or tenant did not act appropriately.