IKEA injured my child

[Bretonbabe]

A shelving unit fell on my 3yo child at IKEA through no fault of his own, (confirmed by them with CCTV) it hit him in the head and pinned him against a wire basket by his neck. I was with him so it was mere seconds he was pinned. The shelving unit grazed & bruised his cheek, and the wire basket bruised his shoulder blade. He cried at first, then went into shock for a good 6hrs, then slept for a very long time due to the stress I think. He received first aid at the store, in the form of an ice pack. They also gave him cola moose sweets. An accident form was filled in, I asked for a copy, this was denied. I was polite but firm that I was understandably unhappy and wanted a full investigation into why this happened. I was told they would ring me the following day to check on my child’s well-being. They didn’t. Finding no way of contacting the individual store, I started a case with Resolver, said I wasn’t happy, no one had checked on my child’s well-being, etc. I then received a phone call a few days later from the same staff member who did the first aid. He asked after my child, agreed that he had suffered bruises & was clearly in shock. This was also when he told me CCTV had been reviewed & that it confirmed my son had not caused the shelving unit to fall. I asked why it had fallen, his answer “we don’t know” so I asked that they find out and give me an answer because how is it safe to go there for anyone!? It’s been a month & I’ve not heard anything. I’ve escalated the case with Resolver, but if nothing happens, or I just get an apology, should I just leave it? Is duty of care not a basic thing, or AIBU? His injuries were superficial but It could have been so much worse, it was so close to his eye. Witnesses were very distressed at the time. It was a horrible experience. We’ve not been back since.

So what exactly was the point of your first reply? Do you think furniture falling on small children is perfectly ok? The OP also did seek medical attention for her child.

OP said “do they not have a duty of care?”

No, they do not have to administer first aid, which was my original point, and also that any investigations that take place as a result of her feedback do not have to be fed back to her.

Their own internal system will have a process regarding H&S but they have done no wrong in law.

”Medical attention” in this case was the GP. HsE is very clear it needs to be hospital treatment so that point is not relevant.

I meant duty of care as in keeping people from being injured on their premises, not the first aid. I’d be appalled though if somewhere didn’t offer first aid when a customer had been injured on site through no fault of their own.

Report to HSE. Let them deal with it.

I think you are being intentionally obtuse. They do have a duty of care in so kuch as ensuring their displays do not fall on top of people.

Well said. I think the previous poster was just trying to derail your thread. It is entirely reasonable to expect shops to put together thier displays in such a way that they do not fall on people.

No, they do not have a duty to report the incident in an accident book. They are not in breech of any HsE regulations by not doing so.
This is probably confusing to laypeople reading this the way you've phrased it.

• There is a duty to record it in the accident book.
• There is not a duty to report the incident to the HSE on a form F2508 under the circumstances described.

There is a duty to provide a copy of the accident book entry to the subject (or the OP in this case as the subject is a child). If Ikea aren't forthcoming the mechanism for getting this is to make a Subject Access Request - by default the entry must include sufficient personally identifying information to meet the SAR requirements if it meets the H&S requirements.

And will everyone else stop saying it should be reported to the HSE. That is wrong. They are not the responsible authority for accidents on retail premises.

IKEA really needs to take this seriously, these kinds of accidents can cost lives. At the very least I would want an apology from the manager and reassurance that it is being investigated and managed accordingly.

It is not just an accident - IKEA shelf units have warnings about being secured to the wall to prevent them falling over and injuring someone - they should follow their own guidelines.

My DD once tried to climb into a wardrobe with 2 bottom drawers - she opened one of the drawers and climbed in and at the same moment pulled it over on herself - luckily there was a bed nearby which prevented the wardrobe falling completely onto her - she was trapped in the space beneath. We then bracketed the wardrobe to the wall for safety.

This is no small matter - flag it up with them; and maybe also on their social media pages.

This incident happened in a shop, the child was able to pull the shelves over, no lasting injury but could have been a broken arm or head injury.
Clearly the display was not safe, the remedy either prevent access or secure safely, liability is clear. I would walk the manager round the store and point out every unsafe display, whoever is responsible for doing risk assessments is not doing their job.

They have a legal duty of care under section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. It's back and white and that other poster really needs to refresh themselves on what those duties of care are as well as the difference between recording accidents and incidents and reporting them to the HSE.