£1670 for exploding shower door at pool- please help

[Showerexplosion]

My children attended a hotel swimming pool with my mum where they all have membership. A few weeks ago a shower door exploded while they were in the changing rooms. My mother maintains that my children did not touch the door and that it simply exploded.

Neither of my children were hit by the broken glass despite both being in only swimming costumes.

Today she received an email stating:

At approximately 16:10, the glass shower door in the ladies’ changing room was found shattered. Photographic evidence is attached. You reported the damage to Reception at that time, but no explanation was provided. Given the seriousness of the situation and the safety risks posed to other guests, we immediately initiated a full and detailed investigation.

As part of this investigation, we commissioned an independent professional specialising in glass safety and installation to assess the damaged door. Their expert conclusion was clear: the door did not fail due to a defect or spontaneous breakage. The shattering was consistent with improper handling or misuse, and not with normal or appropriate use of the facility.

We also reviewed our CCTV footage covering the Spa and Wellness area. The footage confirms that only yourself, xxxxxx and xxxxxx were present in the changing facilities during the time the damage occurred. No other individuals entered the area before or during the incident. This evidence, combined with the professional assessment, leaves no doubt that the door was broken due to inappropriate use while your grandsons were in the changing room.

The cost of replacing the door is £1,674.00. A detailed breakdown of the replacement cost is attached for your review and we request that you notify your insurers of this cost as we are seeking reimbursement of the replacement of this shower door caused by your actions.

In addition, due to the seriousness of the incident, the safety implications, and the behaviour that led to the damage, we have taken the decision to cancel both xxxxx and xxxxx memberships with immediate effect.

Are we liable for this cost? Are we entitled to a refund for the cancelled memberships - we have only used one month of a 3 month membership for both of them.

I include the pictures they sent me. Any help with how to respond greatly appreciated.

I believe your mum. Don’t pay for this. Seek legal advice

I had a shower door explode a few years ago. I think it’s more common than we might think. .

Please check your home insurance to see if you have legal cover and then contact a solicitor. If you do not have legal cover I would suggest either contacting a solicitor who can send over a letter requesting the report and all evidence to be submitted. Alternatively, request it yourself and state you will be seeking legal advice.

They're lucky you have made a counter claim for putting your children at risk. What a bunch of chancers

If you have legal cover on your home insurance, contact them. In the meantime - and if you don't - here's what ChatGPT had to say:

I am not a solicitor, but I can explain how this is normally looked at under English law and what practical steps you can take.
Are you liable for the cost of the door?
Short answer – liability is not automatic, and on the information you have given it is far from clear that you are legally responsible.
Burden of proof
In England, the hotel must show on the balance of probabilities that:

• one of your children or your mother caused the damage, and
• it was caused by negligence or misuse rather than an accident or inherent risk.

They cannot simply invoice you and assume liability. The glass expert report A few important points here:

• Toughened glass can and does shatter suddenly, sometimes with no obvious trigger, particularly if it has a microscopic flaw or has been weakened previously.
• Expert opinions are not infallible, and the wording “consistent with improper handling” does not equal “definitively caused by”.
• If the report was commissioned by the hotel, it is not independent in a legal sense unless jointly instructed or court-appointed.

You are entitled to ask for:

• the full written report
• the expert’s qualifications
• clarification of whether spontaneous failure was ruled out and on what basis

CCTV evidence CCTV showing that only your mother and children were present does not prove misuse. It only shows who was there, not what happened. Presence alone is not evidence of wrongdoing. Children and liability If the children are minors:

• the hotel would need to show a lack of reasonable supervision by your mother
• normal child use of a facility is not automatically “misuse”

Unless the hotel can show deliberate or reckless behaviour, this is a weak argument. Bottom line on liability Based on what you have shared:

• the hotel has asserted responsibility, not proven it
• you are not obliged to pay unless liability is established
• you should not involve insurers unless and until liability is accepted or a claim is made

If they pursue payment, they would need to convince a court, not just you. Are you entitled to a refund for the cancelled memberships? Very likely yes, at least in part. Membership cancellation Hotels and leisure facilities can cancel memberships, but:

• the cancellation must be contractually justified
• the terms must be fair under the Consumer Rights Act 2015

Cancelling memberships based on an unproven allegation is legally risky. Refund entitlement If they have cancelled with immediate effect:

• they cannot normally retain payment for services they are no longer providing
• you should be entitled to a pro-rata refund for the unused portion of the three-month memberships

Keeping the money would likely be considered an unfair contract term unless the contract very clearly allows forfeiture in these circumstances, which is uncommon and often unenforceable. What I recommend you do next

1. Respond in writing

Calmly and firmly:

• deny liability
• state that no misuse occurred
• request full disclosure of the expert report and CCTV evidence relied upon
• state that you do not accept their conclusions

1. Address the refund separately

Explicitly request:

• a pro-rata refund for the unused membership period
• confirmation of how this will be processed

1. Do not pay “without prejudice”

Do not pay anything unless:

• you are satisfied liability is proven, or
• you decide to settle for pragmatic reasons, clearly marked without admission of liability

1. If they persist

If the hotel continues to demand payment:

• ask them to pursue the matter formally
• this usually causes commercial operators to reassess the strength of their position

If they issue a small claim, you would have the opportunity to defend it and they would carry the burden of proof.

Suggested email response:

Dear [name],

Thank you for your email.

We do not agree that we are responsible for the damage to the shower door.
My children did not touch or misuse the door, and there was no inappropriate behaviour in the changing room. While you state that only my mother and children were present, that alone does not explain how the glass shattered or show that it was caused by misuse.

You refer to an expert assessment, but the summary provided does not explain how other possibilities, including spontaneous failure or a pre-existing issue with the glass, were ruled out. Toughened glass is known to shatter suddenly without obvious cause, and the conclusion you have shared does not, on its own, establish liability.

Before we can consider this any further, please provide:

• a copy of the full expert report, including the expert’s qualifications
• clarification on whether spontaneous breakage was considered and how it was excluded
• the CCTV images or footage you are relying on

Until this information is provided and reviewed, we do not accept responsibility for the cost of replacing the door, and we do not agree that insurers should be contacted at this stage.

Separately, you have cancelled both memberships with immediate effect. As only one month of the three-month term has been used, we expect a pro-rata refund for the unused portion of both memberships. Please confirm how this will be arranged.

We would like to resolve this reasonably and look forward to your response.

Kind regards,
[name]

It's not at all unusual for tempered glass to spontaneously combust like this. I've had it happen four times over a 30 year period. A mirrored wardrobe, a shower door, an oven door and an outdoor garden table top. All completely random, no-one was near them or touching them at the time and two times it happened without there even being anyone in the vicinity at all.

What often happens is a very minor knock or dink that caused no visible issue at the time can cause a tiny, often invisible stress fracture that can just burst at some much later date. Sometimes it can be as a result of extreme temperature change as well. This is what I was told by the person who came to replace the item the first it happened to me, because I was just dumbfounded by how it had happened and I knew none of us had caused it in that moment.

You need to get a lawyer's letter or go to CIB at the very least. They are pushing their luck, they know it, they are trying to scare/bully you into paying when they could just claim on their insurance. Even if your mum or kids did accidentally cause it it was an accident while they were there as their paying guests and that's what their insurance is for. They are lucky you isn't sueing them frankly.

If they are trying to suggest it was done deliberately, maliciously or through wilful mistreatment on your mum or your children's part then they are going to have to provide proof and clearly they cannot.

Our shower screen did this earlier this year, my daughter was in the shower and when she went to move the glass door to come out it exploded into a million pieces!

The blooming obvious is in their own pictures - or I have watched too much Sherlock Holmes’s / Agatha Christie

Glass is both inside and outside the cubicle - if it was “hit” then the glass would have been one side only

Years ago, I dropped a Pyrex plate on the floor. It didn't break as you'd expect, it disintegrated. I've never seen anything like it, before or since - it was almost as if the glass was trying to return to its constituent sand.

Not only do you not have to pay, you could infer that you will be suing the hotel for putting small children at danger of exploding glass and cutting themselves by having faulty equipment in public areas. There could have been a very serious accident. I thought at first when I glanced at the post's title that this was the compensation they were offering her!

Wow. I'd love to see that, so long as it was safe.

I am not legally trained in any way…

I would keep things much more simple than the AI suggestion and I wouldn’t bother seeing a solicetor at this point.

Id reply saying that neither you or the kids were responsible that you used the door in a totally normal way and that no one was touching it at the time it spontaneously exploded. State that you won’t be paying and that you won’t reply to any future correspondence about it and that you would like a refund for the rest of the unused membership.

Can your Mum remember what her and the boys said straight after the door exploded? Even if the hotel doesn’t have cctv pictures of it happening I wonder if they have the sound and might have been able to pick up any comments by your Mum and the kids.

Answer:

Don’t be ridiculous. My children were under constant supervision and did not touch the glass. That is a fact. In fact they could have been severely injured. It was a frightening experience for both them and for my mother, and your dangerous facilities are responsible. It is farcical to suggest that six year olds would even have the strength to cause this damage, never mind that they could have walked away blessedly uninjured if they had been right by the door when it exploded. It is also a well documented fact that glass doors such as this can explode without provocation- often due to invisible damage caused weeks or months before.

Your message is insulting and doesn’t even bother to attach this ‘report’ from your ‘expert’. You have responded to responsible customers, who were endangered by your facilities and reported what they saw in good conscience, as if we are criminals. The event was already traumatic, especially for my son, who has autism and needs a calm, quiet, predictable environment (I hate to wonder whether your hostility and accusations are actually due to not wanting children with special needs in your facility?)

I suggest you replace the door with a type that is not dangerous to your customers, whose safety you are responsible for.

I ask that you refund my membership in full- I no longer want to be part of your establishment. And if I get any further difficulty from you on this matter, I will escalate to your Group management and share this shocking treatment publicly.

Yes, I've seen it happen to an oven door panel

My mum's shower did not so long ago. The house insurance dealt with it for her as it happens.

She hadn't touched it. They didn't argue.

It will be affected by heat / cold and vibration I expect.

and even if they touched the glass unless they touched it with the full swing of a lump hammer it should remain intact.

Just as an example, I have watched glass spontaneously shatter including in a shatter resistant office door (they got all the experts out to look at that one) which I hadn’t touched.
They are being ridiculous.

We're getting a new bathroom next year. It might be old fashioned and not wonderfully attractive, but I'm seriously considering changing the plans and getting a shower in the bath with a shower curtain. Those don't explode...

I will admit to not reading all of the replies.

• as PPs have said shower doors can, and do, spontaneously shatter
• the photo looks as though there has been damage to the frame and a hinge is hanging off - that is not spontaneous damage.
• does your mother have photos of the scene as she left it? Is th hinge hanging off in those photos.
• Have you asked to see their CCTV evidence? Does it show your children near the door/banging it/being boisterous at the moment it breaks?

The hinge damage makes me wonder whether one of your children might’ve caused the damage, but of course that could’ve been pre-existing.

You're right. From a scientific point of view, it was fascinating. The plate literally disintegrated from a whole object into a pile of tiny stones. At the time I didn't have a camera handy and my main concern was to get rid of the debris before the cats came to investigate. If it happened now, I'd take a photo.

I had to destroy some toughened glass shelves a few years back and I can tell you, even that won’t do it, if the glass is properly treated at manufacture, There’s no way a child could do it unless the glass was seriously flawed.

Another spontaneous glass oven door explosion here

Are there cameras in the changing rooms and shower areas? Is that unusual?

I’d also love to know what they think the two small children did for that to happen

Presumably the implication is that they slammed or struck the door in some manner.

surely they should be absolutely shatter proof and made of safety glass

Tempered safety glass (which is what is shown in OPs photos) is designed to shatter on impact, and disintegrate into small, blunt pieces.

Toughened glass is pre-stressed. By heating the glass then cooling the outside with air jets while the inside is still hot the outside hardens and shrinks first. The when the centre cools and shrinks it compresses the outside while remaining in tension in the centre.

that makes the glass very strong because the compressed outside is very resistant to crack propagation, while the now weakened centre is protected from contact.

To break glass requires the input of energy: it makes new surface area, which has to overcome surface tension (the same reason it’s hard to split water drops). When toughened glass fails all the elastic energy is released at once which is utilized by breaking the glass into thousands of tiny pieces with lots of surface area. Thst means that there are no large sharp shards to cut anyone.

Hope that’s interesting…