6 year old child injured at Haven holiday park

[Pat-Uk]

Good afternoon

 

We were all on holiday at Rockley Park in April and whilst there my 6 year old was injured on the neck by a rope.

 

Basically the park has water walker balls which are bog inflatable balls that sit in a pool which people can run around inside of. These are tied to the edge of the pool so the operators can pull the balls in.

 

The operator had tied the rope to a fence in such a way that when the balls were pushed out the rope went taught across an area where children could walk and play, there were no warning signs and no obvious sign of a risk until it was too late.

 

My son was standing watching the balls when one of the operators pushed a ball into the middle of the pool, the rope went taught across my sons neck, knocked him to the ground and put a gash across his neck.

 

This was the first day of our holiday. And as a result of his injury we were unable to swim or do some other things. It took 9 weeks for it to clear up.

 

We reported it at the time, took photos and wrote to Haven on our return, they sent acknowledgement letter and then took over 3 months to send their final response which basically says

 

We've investigated and all our health and safety procedures are correct, and a child of six should have been supervised. But we'll give a goodwill payment of £50

 

Our son was supervised,we were standing next to him when it happend, we were not aware if any danger in a child play area.

 

Am I wrong in thinking this is a pathetic offer ?

We spend over £500 on this holiday plus fuel and it was ruined. An offer of somthing towards another holiday to make up for our ruined one I think would have been more appropriate

Edited August 6, 2011 by Pat-Uk

[perplexity]

Am I wrong in thinking this is a pathetic offer ?

 

I would call it wrong to expect a forum like this to form an opinion without the opportunity to hear from the other side

 

On an issue that appears to be entirely a question of fact, it could do more harm than good to subscribe to a story that may or may not be the whole truth and nothing but.

[raydetinu]

If you want to take this further and make a libility claim then you need to consult a solicitor

what did you actually say in your original letter, did you ask for compensation etc.?

was child seen by a doctor, or taken to hospital or seen by first aider on site.

Was the incident reported in the accident book on site.

You need to be clear in what you actually want from this; compensation or report an unsafe procedure that should be investigated by their health and safety department.

From what you say it does sound as though the staff menber was responsable for your sons injury and the risk of this happening would have very high.

I would at least ask what risk assessmets had been undertaken for them operating in this way.

I believe you would have a valid claim and you should make one.

[perplexity]

If you claim is winnable it should be easy enough to find a "no win no fee" personal injury specialist to take an interest but this is not the best place to look.

 

If they don't want to know, I would trust their judgement. They see a lot more of this sort of thing than I do.

[dx100uk]

urm...

 

i agree the compo is a bit thin

but you were there and p'haps were as responsible as the operator?

 

i wonder what those ropes do.........

 

not convinced you or your son didnt already know that the balls were pushed out like that......

 

silly place to tie them up i agree

silly height to tie them up at

 

dx