Were you injured due to a product that somebody else has made, and you are wondering if you have a viable lawsuit on your hands? Here are a few common questions you may have about this legal situation.

Were You Using The Product In The Designed Way? 

One important thing to ask yourself is if you were using the product in the proper way. Defective product lawsuits are the strongest when you are using the product as the manufacturer intended. Think of cooking appliances like a pressure cooker, which have had lawsuits where the product exploded. Of course, the viability of the lawsuit depends on if you were using the product properly, which can be difficult to prove in court.

Was The Product Manufactured Improperly?

Another aspect to look at is if the product was manufactured improperly and caused the injury as a result. Going back to the pressure cooker example, these products are designed with a relief valve which will release pressure if it is too high. If that valve is defective and does not release the pressure, then the pressure cooker can explode. Think about a similar situation where a safety mechanism may have failed and caused the injury, and if that applies to your case.

Did The Product Not Have A Safety Warning?

Some products are dangerous to use based on the nature of what they are and require proper safety warnings to ensure that they are used in the right manner. You could potentially use the lack of safety information to justify a lawsuit because you did not know that a safety issue was there. For example, you may not know that an electric blanket can burn somebody quite badly if used improperly, which is why safety warnings need to be placed on devices.

Was The Product Designed Poorly? 

It's also possible that the product was designed and works as intended, but the design of the product simply leads to an injury. A manufacturer may try to claim that the problem is a user error, but you need to think about if somebody can easily become injured by the product from normal use. A good example is a portable fan. The grills on old fans were big enough where a child could place their finger inside the fan and touch the blade, and since then the grills have been made much smaller to prevent injuries. 

Think you have a defective product lawsuit on your hands? Reach out to a defective product law office for more info.