We rely on a myriad of consumer products to get by each day because that’s how life works for the average city dweller. We don’t have the time for applying manual power to every task, and we lack in skills to prepare everything ourselves from scratch. We don’t think twice before grabbing something off the shelf in the market because everything available for purchase is supposed to fulfill the state’s provisions of consumer law. According to standard procedures, every consumer item has to go through extensive testing before being approved for public distribution, but discrepancies occur sometimes. 

When the consumer incurs a serious injury and/or property damage because of a purchased product (despite using it properly or reasonably) then they may qualify to file product liability claim or lawsuit. However, every state has certain statutes of limitations and eligibility requirements for inciting legal action. Florida Personal Injury Attorney can guide you through the claiming process and help you acquire the compensation you deserve.

Basis of Product Liability

In Florida, any case of product liability is a civil action that addresses negligence, breach of warranty, violation of a duty, or misconduct with respect to the design, construction, manufacture, preparation, assembly, or installation of a consumer product. Typically, there are several stages involved between planning and delivering a consumer product. As a result, it can be tricky to determine that where an error occurred or if more than one party along the supply chain is responsible. For this reason, product liability claims and lawsuits fall under three main categories:

1. Design Defect

If the product was created in accordance to a flawed design, the manufacturer or seller might not be to blame. The engineer or developers of a concept are the ones at fault, as they may have deliberately or unintentionally overlooked the possible drawbacks of their design. It is nearly impossible for someone lacking in technical knowledge to point out defects in a virtual model, sample prototype, or blueprint. The shortcoming usually resides in a small portion of the complete design, so it goes unnoticed and proceeds to the next stage. Sometimes, the problem in design is identified during product testing, but corrective procedures are too expensive, so it is purposely ignored.

2. Manufacturing Defect

Errors made during manufacture or assembly are the most frequent cause of product liability. What happens is that the designated personnel fail to accurately implement a design or follow instructions to build or compile the product. This means that the original design or concept was spot on and safe, but an issue occurred during its execution. The manufacturer or assembler may have used low quality/wrong material spare parts, omitted a step/procedure, altered the design for convenience/to cut down costs, or misinterpreted particular guidelines.  It is also possible that the product was contaminated or damaged during development. The defect could be limited to a few goods or exist in the entire batch.

3. Marketing Defect or Failure to Warn

It is lamentable that advertisements/commercials for consumer products are often exaggerated or misleading. The ulterior motive of product creators is to earn as much profit as possible, and sometimes they risk the well-being of consumers to achieve their goal. The product does not work as advertised, or the side effects are not mentioned. Every product does not require usage instructions, but oftentimes warnings are not included on the label despite being a necessity with respect to the function and composition of an item.  As a result, consumers suffer the consequences, which include emotional and physical damages.