The most common insurance claims filed by restaurants and food venues

PERSPEX and metal shavings in your food, flying signs and food poisoning. If these claims are anything to go by, we should all cook at home more.

mop and bucket

EVERY time you walk out your door you’re faced with all kinds of risk — speeding drivers, potholes hiding under rain water and falling pianos. That last one may have been a Wile E Coyote skit.

But it seems one of the times when it’s fraught with danger is when you’re eating out. At least it certainly seems that way if the most common insurance claims from food venues are anything to go by.

SLIPS AND FALLS

As expected, ‘slips and falls’ are the most common type of liability claim made by restaurants and cafes, according to insurance company AAMI.

Venues which fail to signpost a wet area can face a customer who’s not only embarrassed the hell out of themselves with their impression of a novice cartoon ice-skater, they can also be slapped with a lawsuit for injuries such as a cracked coccyx. That’s your butt bone by the way.

UNEXPECTED SURPRISES

AAMI has also received a whole buffet of claims lodged by restaurants after their patrons found ‘foreign objects’ in their meals — metal screws, pieces of Perspex (mm, crunchy) and fragments of wood (mm, earthy). Inexplicably, the insurer has received claims for “metal shavings”. Maybe the sous chef mistook a chunk of metal for truffle or pecorino?

Shaved cheese is a welcome addition to many dishes but shaved metal? Not so much ...

Of course, none of sound as bad as a recent case in the US state of Utah. A woman was hospitalised after drinking iced tea laced with lye — a particularly harsh chemical compound. The lye was accidentally mixed into the drink because it was mislabelled in the kitchen. Yikes.

FOOD POISONING

Food contamination could lead to hours and days hunched over a toilet bowl. For a restaurant, it could lead to thousands of dollars in damages or a swath of bad online reviews. So it’s a lose-lose for everyone. According to AAMI, the most common food contamination claims have involved foods such as raw eggs in homemade concoctions such as custard and mayonnaise, and cured meats such as salami.

Lawsuits for food poisoning aren’t uncommon. Last year, a WA man threatened to sue a function centre after nine guests at his wedding, including the poor bride, spent the night being sick after eating the pork.

FLYING OBJECTS

Another hazard when you’re dining out is being hit with collapsing umbrellas and flying signs. If it’s a windy day and that flapping awning outside the cafe looks a bit loose, here’s a hint: don’t sit under it. AAMI said it’s received many claims for injuries caused by marquees, umbrellas and signs that weren’t secured properly.

HOT COFFEE

Warning: it’s hot.

And then there’s the classic hot liquid danger. They have been plenty of claims filed for employees who have accidentally spilt hot liquid on a customer, causing some nasty burns.

Last year, a 22-year old Adelaide woman, Jessica Sussan Wishart, sued a McDonald’s because she had spilt hot McDonald’s coffee on her own lap while in a moving car. She claimed McDonald’s failed to warn her that the hot coffee was hot.

In 1994, a jury in the US famously awarded a woman $US2.8 million in a lawsuit when she suffered burns to six per cent of her body after spilling McDonald’s coffee in her lap.

Of course, you can’t stay hiding in your house under your safety blanket forever. Sometimes, those amazing marinated beef ribs are worth leaving your abode for. But if you’re looking for an excuse to cook at home more, the five above make a convincing argument.

Originally published as The most common insurance claims filed by restaurants and food venues