Car damaged by a Shopping Trolley

Missy46

Hello, whilst leaving a Matalan car park today my car was hit by a stray shopping trolley causing damage to the back of my car (car is scratched/dented and the paint work is now peeling) there is nothing we could’ve done to have avoided being hit as the trolley was hidden by cars and the first we saw of it was when it hit our car.
We have spoken to the store that owned the trolley and they are saying there is nothing they can do, even though they have failed to keep the car park free for stray trolleys. Do any of you know if we can make a claim against them or if they are obliged to pay for the damage?

Thanks

iamana1ias

No you can't. There will be signs clearly indicating that you park at your own risk and they aren't responsible for any damage caused in the carpark.

lisyloo

They would only be obliged if they were negilgent.

You would need proof that they were negligent, they cannot be expected to follow every single customer 24x7.

Personally I think you would have a very hard job showing negligence, because it's probably a customer that left the trolley lose and not Matalan and it's not reasonable to expect them to monitor every trolley ALL the time.

mikey72

The signs are completely meaningless, so ignore them.
It depends on whether or not they have people who collect the trollies during the day.
If they don't, you won't get anywhere.
If they do employ people who should be collecting them, then you have an arguement they were negligent, and may be able to take it further.

Reading your post again, did you back into the trolley, or did it blow into you?

wealdroam

lisyloo wrote: »

They would only be obliged if they were negilgent.

You would need proof that they were negligent, they cannot be expected to follow every single customer 24x7.

Personally I think you would have a very hard job showing negligence, because it's probably a customer that left the trolley lose and not Matalan and it's not reasonable to expect them to monitor every trolley ALL the time.

I agree with this.

Wee_Willy_Harris

Forget it. As long as the store have made reasonable efforts to prevent stray trollies, you haven't got a hope. Reasonable efforts would include specific bays for trolly parking/storage, trolly collectors, etc etc. The only chance you have is to identify the specific user of the trolly at the time and take action against them. As others have stated, it would be unreasonable to expect a store to have a member of staff follow every trolly in use.... and would make your grocery shopping very, very expensive!

pimento

Our local Matalan has a deposit system for trolleys and the locals are far too tight to lose their £1, so all the trolleys are returned and there are none loose about the carpark.

Perhaps you could ask Matalan about instituting this in your local store to save someone else the aggravation of it happening to them.

HouseHuntr

Missy46 wrote: »

Hello, whilst leaving a Matalan car park today my car was hit by a stray shopping trolley causing damage to the back of my car (car is scratched/dented and the paint work is now peeling) there is nothing we could’ve done to have avoided being hit as the trolley was hidden by cars and the first we saw of it was when it hit our car.
We have spoken to the store that owned the trolley and they are saying there is nothing they can do, even though they have failed to keep the car park free for stray trolleys. Do any of you know if we can make a claim against them or if they are obliged to pay for the damage?

Thanks

Sounds just like the trees that jump out onto roads and hit cars or lawnmowers going out of control.

Yawwwwwwnnnnnnnn !

Missy46

mikey72 wrote: »

The signs are completely meaningless, so ignore them.
It depends on whether or not they have people who collect the trollies during the day.
If they don't, you won't get anywhere.
If they do employ people who should be collecting them, then you have an arguement they were negligent, and may be able to take it further.

Reading your post again, did you back into the trolley, or did it blow into you?

The trolley rolled into us whilst exiting the car park

iamana1ias

Missy46 wrote: »

The trolley rolled into us whilst exiting the car park

At such speed that you didn't notice when it was, say, a foot away?

adviceforall

Our back light was damaged in a Tesco car park by a runaway trolley and totally smashed the plastic, we had a note left on the car saying what had happened while we were inside shopping but like above there's not much you can do about it...Our is a motorbility car so there goes the £200 good condition bonus at the end of the 3 years.