Accident on holiday 2025

Kiki7976

Hi there

I'm wondering if anyone can point me in the right direction. 

I have MS and I went on holiday last year with my family. I hired an EV scooter for the whole time.  I used a boat (taxi boat?)and  unfortunately while coming off the boat my scooter clipped a huge part of the ramp tipping me and my scooter over. Tur dcooter landed on me.I fell on my wrist. I had used this taxi boat lots of times through the holiday (and other times I had previously visited over the years  with with my family) so I was familiar with how it was done. Normally I had assistance from the captain to help me? This time no one helped me. I was left to go alone. When I fell over on the dock suddenly everyone flooded me - including the skipper who was meant to guide me. They jumped off the boat to help. A nurse suddenly flew to my aid to inspect me. They checked me out and said I was fine. Just get on with my day. I knew that was rubbish but I didnt want to cause a fuss. I wanted to go home. I had two days left. I would just put up with it. I later found out when I returned to UK that I had chipped a bone in my wrist. I wasn't surprised.
I have someone looking into this in America for me. But I forgot to mention that i DID inform the scooter hire company I had an a accident when returning the scooter. I called them and briefly mentioned it. The scooter battery fell out but apart from that nothing happened to it (probably because i took the brunt if it).They were lovely people and I thought it was the right thing to do. In my head. I wanted to go home
I forgot to mention it to my lawyer that I reported it to the EVC company before I flew home. Should I have? 

Many thanks for your advise. 

Exodi

Are you looking for compensation then? Against the holiday taxi company? Do you have travel insurance?

The basis of your claim appears to be that they were negligent in not assisting you off the taxi boat? Did you ask for assistance?

Did you cut your holiday short or did you fly home as originally planned? As you then got it seen to by the NHS, did you incur any provable costs as a direct result of their alleged negligence?

Were you in the US or where did the random American lawyer come from? Not an ambulance-chase firm I hope?

Personally if you incurred no costs and are otherwise unaffected by the incident, I'd forget about it.

Kiki7976

No not an ambulance chasers. I have relatives in th US and we worked together to get a good lawer.
I have holiday insurance but everything getting BIG, you know? They are accepting no liability because it could be me that caused it. Bad driving lol. 
The whole accident happened in the US.
Usually on getting on the taxi boat they asked if you needed accistance as you went onto the taxi boat. But the crew asked if u needed guided back off the boat while u were on the boat anyway. I agreed. 

Flugelhorn

agree with Exodi  - what are you wanting?  was the scooter damaged? did you have any losses ? 

Kiki7976

I held on for three days more. I was going home anyway. I self medicated with paracetamol or whatever I could get to take the pain off until I got home. 

Kiki7976

Yes compensation for the last 4 days of my holiday, yes. The scooter iron8cally was fine but it think thats because it fell on to of me! 

Kiki7976

I had my arm in a sort of cast for one month. Given strong painkillers.  Hard to drive or use my walker

Slinky

If you needed assistance and it wasn't offered, why didn't you ask for it? Did you ask and they refused to help? You have to take some responsibility for your own care if you knew you would need help.

MyRealNameToo

Kiki7976 said:

Yes compensation for the last 4 days of my holiday, yes. The scooter iron8cally was fine but it think thats because it fell on to of me! 

Kiki7976 said:

I had my arm in a sort of cast for one month. Given strong painkillers.  Hard to drive or use my walker

So what are your actual losses other than the pain, suffering and loss of amenities? Sounds like you were able to complete your holiday and so no obvious causes of additional losses. 

Presumably after the cast there was nothing else wrong and no lasting impacts?

Any video/CCTV of the incident? Any witnesses that you have the details of?

There is at least a reasonable prospect that you will be considered the author of your own misfortune. Its likely that the previous skippers were being nice with trying to assist you but that ultimately its your own responsibility to get yourself on and off safely, its not like you are alleging that the ramp was missing its grip tape or that it was damaged in some way that caused the fall. 

It's likely that you are talking a small claims court claim, though it will depend on which state jurisdiction applies, in which case any lawyer fees you are going to have to pay yourself. In the UK for something that recovers in a circa a month the compensation, if any was won, would be dwarfed by the legal fees and you'd likely be out of pocket and thats if you win, if you lose then you'd clearly be further out of pocket.

Kiki7976

Truthfully I did ask for help. Anyone in wheelchairs and scooters would get assistance etc. 

JGB1955

What are your monetary losses?  Who do you think has been negligent?