No matter which company you work for, you will be faced with safety-related vulnerabilities. This is due to the fact that whenever a man confronts a machine, hazards are inevitable.
Comprehend Public Ideologies and trends
The terms of the Product Liability Law vary from place to place and can be termed as “local” e.g. one country has a set of laws that are completely banned in another.
The law’s application can vary even within different dominions. These type of cases revolve around emotional and political influences that affect the results.
The Things You Need to Know
Usually, the preventive measures you take after the occurrence of an accident for the future are not a liability against you in terms of admittance to any flaw.
This legal theory is termed as “subsequent remedial measures.” And the reasoning behind this is that manufacturers should always feel comfortable for improvising their products.
This type of evidence is admissible only for ownership purposes or for reinforcing a substitute plan.
The term “product” in the law is not limited to only the products that were meant to be sold to the client base. Other company related products including the brochures, agreements, manuals and labels are also part of the lawsuit vulnerability and should therefore be handled with professional care.
Guidelines when Modifying Product Designs or Warnings
Take care to not leave anything as incomplete in the to-do list
Pay attention to opinions and suggestions from customers and designers
Give an explanation for every design change. Make sure the reasons and cons are adequately documented
Prevent cost from being the deciding factor in design changes or continuances
Avoid making use of email and messages and instead make use of in-person short meetings or conversations as these can be easily searched for and used against you in a lawsuit. Also, this would result in increased time-efficiency of business experts
What You Say is Accountable
Your documentation is a very critical part of the whole process. It is very important to consider that every part of the document is liable to be presented to the jury and should be drafted as such.
Ensure that the document speaks for you without abusing the older versions while making use of phrases such as:
Superior/enhanced utility and/or safety (instead of ‘fixing a flaw’)
Takes care of product misuse (instead of recording hazards)
Integrates new technology or scientific knowledge
Way to Go in a Global Market
It is crucial that your company make efforts to apply not only all possible lawful regulations and standards but also all high valued norms of the respective industry. This is important because many a times there is no single rule set to follow to the point.
It is not possible for any lawyer to specify some rule and state that it will provide full protection against all forms of liability. A case only happens if there has been some health damage to someone so the key is to always try to ensure it does not happen.
Safety Hierarchy
In order to prevent accidents, a general agreement among safety experts has resulted in the following sequence of actions:
Specify the danger point and eradicate it
Make use of preventive technologies
Incorporate caution signs in the system
Provide proper training and instructions to workers
Specify personal safety gear
The manufacturer’s claim can be tested in various ways to ensure an adequate amount of preventive measure but following these five steps go a long way in defending your claim in the future.
