A mobility scooter crashed into me

[Invalidusername88]

Sitting in a cafe nearly finished eating and this mobility scooter tries to get through the gap between my table and the wall. The frame of the scooter hit my table, she carried on going, the table spun round and sandwiched me against the wall, the table digging into my stomach with her still going. I was genuinely worried it wasn't going to stop but eventually it did, a few people including security came running. I was ok apart from a swollen arm and bruises. My memory is a bit blurry now but I think she took out the table and chairs behind me too.

Not sure what I'm looking for here apart from other people's opinions - has anything like this ever happened to you? If this had been a small child they would have been seriously injured. Similarly if I was pregnant this wouldn't have been good. Nothing against mobility scooters previously although a lot more wary now 😂

No one has suggested all disabled people should sit at home. We've just pointed out that it's unacceptable for mobility scooter users to injure others

It's unacceptable for anyone to injure others.

Whilst I agree, that doesn't answer the real problem of mobility scooter drivers who are incompetent or arrogant and injure other people, does it? Regardless of their disability, no one has any right to injure someone else. Of course genuine accidents happen, but some of the drivers are literally an accident waiting to happen as they just don't care about other people.

Nobody has the right to injure anyone else, disabled or not. With the best will in the world, accidents can happen. I have a young relative who needs a mobility aid to get to university and work. She would very upset if she ever injured anyone and I admire her courage for getting on with life, despite her disability.

It's not an accident if someone is using any potentially lethal piece of equipment which they either can't manage safely, or which they use recklessly. That goes for those with and without disabilities

How many mobility scooters users know you can only ride at 4mph inside public places.

I work at a supermarket and have many customers who ride them. Most of them are ok.

Some aren’t. A colleague got ran over by a mobility scooter as he sped around the corner. He then reversed his scooter and my colleague’s fleece got caught in his wheel and she was dragged about 5m. The problem is he’s very deaf. So no matter how many customers and colleagues were shouting STOP at him and other things. He ignored the situation and went straight to the kiosk.

My colleague suffered from bruising and a sore shoulder. The incident was captured on CCTV.

Another time when we had alcohol on the end of an aisle, a man on his MS cut the corner and knocked off about £500 of booze off the shelves. He never stopped or apologised.

I agree that there should be compulsory training and insurance for mobility scooters. As I also believe that many users never drove a car so have no concept of control and speed. Especially many older women never drove and relied on their husbands to drive.

No mobility scooter should go on the road. There’s a major roundabout which I use most days. One day, the traffic was so slow. Turns out that a woman on a mobility scooter was riding on the roundabout!

The management can’t ban the first man as he could sue us as discrimination

I was hit by one inside bingo hall caused me serious leg injuries and someone almost hit me today and another customer inside co op lincoln the lady older lady i say in her 80s back up and almost went hit me and another customer inside the shop it got reported but no action was taken they should not be inside buildings like shops and bingo halls they are becoming a nuisance and twice now i nearly had one hit me and actually hit me in less then two years

I have rented a mobility scooter a couple of times - I can only walk very short distances, and even with a walker, I can’t go much further, so I use a wheelchair to go to the supermarket etc. I’ve hired a scooter at a n open air museum and the zoo, because otherwise I couldn’t have gone.

Both times I was briefed on how to use the scooter, and showed how to control the speed - both times the scooter had a control to increase or decrease the speed that was separate from the levers that you used to make the scooter go backwards and forwards. I am well aware I am a total novice, and that I am controlling a vehicle, so I have been very conservative about the speed I selected.

Being able to use a scooter has given me the opportunity to have experiences I wouldn’t otherwise have had - going to the zoo or a museum with my son, DIL and grandchildren. Without the scooter, I couldn’t have accessed either place, and would have ended up left home alone, or sitting somewhere while everyone else went and had fun.

But the stories on here show clearly that scooters can be a hazard, and users must be responsible and careful.

Banning them from shops etc would means some people would never be allowed in them. You would be denying disabled people access to places, and that would not be legal.

I don’t think they’re any different to entitled and incompetent motorists, or people who ride their bikes through town centres, or idiots riding e scooters anywhere, or pedestrians. 90% of them will be considerate and safe and you won’t even notice them, and 10% will be dangerous twats who shouldn’t be allowed out by themselves.

I hire a scooter when we go to Centre Parcs as I’ve got some mobility issues and it saves my DH from pushing a wheelchair. The speed stays on its lowest setting and I’m so careful and aware of who’s around me. It’s why I haven’t hit any of the people I seem to be invisible to as soon as I sit in it, who just step right into my path. There’s one particular very short but very steep bit of hill with gates either side to stop cyclists, so you have to do a bit of a zig zag to get through. It always feels like I’m in danger of rolling backwards if I stop halfway up it. So I wait til it’s clear and then go for it. Because of the gates and the giant size of the scooter, there’s not much room. And without fail, some group of idiots will see me coming, three quarters of the way up the slope, make eye contact with me and decide that’s the time to walk through the gate four abreast, kids running everywhere.

Anywhere it’s possible to interact with other people, there will be dangerous twats.