3-2-1 ....lawsuit?

I would at the very least contact corporate and let them know what happened.

The second sentence of this story is completely unnecessary. It should have been left out. The point still gets across without gross exaggeration.

Yep, sounds about right.

As long as we're the litigious society that we are managers will be more concerned with the paperwork then the person.

Like I say in every k-mart story, Sears is the same way. I always tried my best (we did have a fully stocked first aid kit) but I couldn't even ever say "sorry" because like a car crash "sorry" could be construde as admitting fault and that just won't fly.

@EyeHeartPie: hu·mor Audio Help /ˈhyumər or, often, ˈyu-/ Pronunciation[hyoo-mer or, often, yoo-]
-noun
1. a comic, absurd, or incongruous quality causing amusement: the humor of a situation.

What a vivid picture you painted there Chris!

@EyeHeartPie: Just be glad I didn't go with my first five choices for the illustration.

It's funny to me that the behavior of the mgr to delay medical attention to get paperwork signed is exactly what would make it an even more libelous situation for the company.

Two thumbs up for K-Mart!

Or, you know, one.

@tande: but I couldn't even ever say "sorry" because like a car crash "sorry" could be construde as admitting fault and that just won't fly.

How about even, "Hey are you okay? Let's take care of that now."

Jeez, uncaring swines at K-Mart.

As soon as you get an ignorant response i.e "the pharmacy is closed right now" - you should immediately request an ambulance. And then grab the most expensive piece of clothing you can find to stop the bleeding. And maybe fall down because of the blood loss.
The last two are sarcastic but I bet if you'd have asked for the ambulance someone would have shown a little common sense.

@tande: Ding-ding-ding. We have a winner.

These stores now have to be so careful about this crap that helping somebody can get you in more trouble (they hurt you worse, you get an infection from a person not trained in first aid, etc).

The manager was an ass about it all though

@Juggernaut: You're kidding, but there are people who would do just that.

Blue light special in Aisle 5...fingers, now 10% off!

@Lo-Pan: But if the mgr, an employee or even just a private individual makes a good faith attempt to help, but accidentally makes the injuries worse, aren't they covered under the Good Samaritan Law?

Well to provide an opposite scenario to this. I was at the Mandarin Oriental in Hong Kong for afternoon tea. Across from me was a caucasian couple. A waiter somehow dropped a plate or something. In doing so it appeared that the woman had cut her hand on one of the plate shards. They had like 3 managers over there in a flash and were tending to her. I wish I could have overheard what they were doing, but you could tell they were concerned about the couple's welfare. As a side note, this is Hong Kong, where you can't sue anyone for anything, so they weren't afraid of a lawsuit.

This article belongs under "Stupid Consumer".

Seriously, why would you sign papers after injuring yourself at someone's home or business? What right is that of theirs or obligation of yours? Simply walk out. I can not remotely fathom why someone would stick a pen and paper in your hand and you'd just sign it. Lame.

huh... When I worked mall security (you want to hear about bad consumerism, I got plenty of stories, and all except one is the stores frickin' fault), the first questions asked on ANY sort of injury is "Are you ok? Do you want an ambulance.", I know all the store managers are trained that way to, because we would be called to assist with first aid, and they already asked that or called a paramedic.

Also, for an area about 1+ mile of floorspace under our control, we had 3 first aid kits and one AED, with a MAX response time of 3 minutes, and this is just inside, not including parking lots. Kmart is a HECK of lot smaller than the mall i worked at, and they had only 1, that was locked up after a certain hour! As i'm typing this and thinking, it sounds more like the manager was lazy, because so many stores are paranoid about lawsuits that there had to be another accessible somewhere.

@graymulligan: HAHA Nice.

@graymulligan: Thanks for making me spit soda all over myself! =P

That's what you get for shopping at a cut-rate store. :)

Why did you sign any paperwork, if they did not help you out first?

What do you get for signing anything? If you get nothing then why do it?

I volunteer at a museum in San Diego, and once in awhile we have a visitor trip or something -- just had one this past Saturday who tripped and cut himself. I've found that expressing true concern over their well-being tends to soothe their spirits and makes the situation go away. People realize that accidents happen, and reasonable people won't go ballistic if they know the problem is being dealt with.

The best part about this story is he bought some shit from the store anyway! I'm not blaming the consumer, but damn...

I'd be willing to settle this issue out of court.

My sister has a similar story from several years ago - she cut her foot on the revolving door at a KMart and asked for a bandage. She was told that they have no bandages. So my sister walked to aisle whatever, grabbed a box of band aids, brought it back, and said, can I have one of these please so I can stop bleeding all over your floor?

A few days later someone from "corporate" called her and she wound up with a couple hundred dollars for her troubles.

Depending on the severity of the injury and the pain level, it might have been really, REALLY fun to bleed on merchandise.

@satoru: I'm sold. I'll shop only from clearance racks at Mandarin Oriental hotels!

Wow, 25 comments and not one "That's why I don't shop at [insert retailer]. I'm so proud of you guys.

@nycaviation:

That's why I don't shop. Period. ; )

Amazon Prime ftw!

Ah, good old memories! Hear is the inside info.

I worked at sears as LP for a while, which sounds like since Kmart = Sears now, they have the same policy. I used to DREAD getting the injury phone call.

Pretty much what we had to do, and sounds like the manager in question had to do the same thing. Was go out and interview any customer who was injured within the store. There was a list of questions and a checklist to perform, but they told you not to take it with you. I believe there may have even been a form for the customer to sign if you felt they would be willing to do so. Any video evidence of the incident was immediately, pulled and kept in a special lockup. There forth, things like the front doors and escalators were always recorded because they were more accident prone.

We were "trained" to try to act concerned but the questions were more geared at eliminating our liability. We would provide simple first aid, and obviously call in paramedics if it was so required. The majority of the time it was just people with a slight injury who wanted nothing from us other than a bandaid or to be left alone.

If there were any sort of fluids spilled (blood, etc) we had to just a special cleanup kit like the one mentioned.

Once all of this was done, we were required to immediately phone the injury into some special insurance hotline, where they entered in all the information that we were able to get. They asked for our take on the situation, as well as pretty much any way to blame the customer. (Example: Were their shoes old and perhaps the cause of the fall?)

I hated doing this because I did feel it was corporate bullshoot, and I had many conversations with the insurance company where the only thing I could say was "customer left before i could ask any questions" aka, I rendered simple first aid and let them go.

You can't blame the company entirely, we were show many actual cases of people faking accidents that were later caught by video tape to be shown to be fake, but without proper training and common sense a manager could be confused and respond like the original story.

Perhaps the manager would have taken the complaint more seriously if Paul had written his statement in HIS OWN BLOOD.

@ndjustin: You forgot the part where you had go to the web page and fill out the follow up from the insurance company. Not only the LP manager but IIRC two other managers had to sign off (HR seems like it was one but that might of just been associate reports).

And woe to the LPM that didn't jump right on that because it would hurt the metrics and as the DLPM would remind you in a call the second that the report expired, you're pulling down the district's metrics.

Not to mention the loving care that we'd give one of the people that got injured if they happened to call the store for a follow up instead of waiting for the issurance people to call them.

@ndjustin: I don't blame the company for having forms or policy. I've worked quite a few places where this was just standard. There were forms and things to take care of. And honestly, where I work now, I shudder to think of what I would have to do since I have to fill out eight forms of paperwork if I even speak to a customer.

That said, I don't understand why following policy would instantly mean following a script instead of providing service along with CYA measures. It's so simple to say, "Oh, that must hurt. Our first aid kit is in the pharmacy, but it's closed, let me call the manager."

Then the manager comes over and says, "Here, we'll use this box of bandaids here. Do you need anything else for that cut? I know this is the last thing you want to think about but we've got a few forms we have to fill out with you. Do you have some time?"

Tadaa, a simple change in wording and the problem is solved!

Time to take one of those Monty Python props to KMart and do the whole "don't bother, just a flesh wound -- do you have a bloodborne pathogen cleanup kit handy?" thing as your fake stump streams colored water all over their floor.

I'd like to see that on Youtube... any takers?

He should've started running around the store screaming: "I'M BLEEEEEDING!" and spewing blood everywhere. I'm 100% sure the manager would've found out a way to help him real quick.

@Thunderpants: Good on her!

As I was reading the part where Paul was basically pleading for first aid supplies to staunch the flow of blood, I was thinking "Wow, too bad there are no other bandages in the county other than those in the first aid kit in the closed pharmacy". If this manager had half a heart, she would have gone to the first aid aisle and taken what was needed.

@Thunderpants:

+++
Doesn't KMart have a whole AISLE dedicated to bandages and stuff like that? Just damage it out.

Last summer I was cut on a thin metal rod sticking out at some odd angle from a shelf at Home Depot. An employee saw it happen and looked away, pretending he didn't. Another one walked by as my husband mopped up the blood running down my arm with the one tissue we had with us, he also said and did nothing. My husband got mad at me for not reporting it but I just wanted out of there and walked out. It wasn't quite deep enough for stitches (although pretty long at about 4") and I'm better at first aid than they would have been anyway. I knew there would have been paperwork and I wasn't signing anything. FWIW there's still a pretty good scar.

Actually all business are required by OSHA to have a first aid kit always at hand. The manager should have been able to go to that kit and get something to clean and bandage the wound. It doesn't matter if the Pharmacy is closed or not. Ever spend time in a manager's office or in the back of a deli? There's always a first aid kit nailed to the wall somewhere.

@EyeHeartPie: Hush your mouth, whinebag.

If they are going to make you write a statement, at least write something like "As I sit here dripping blood in Kmart, their refusal to provide first aid is making me lightheaded. I feel I may pass out soon. At least they..."

When I was 17 I slipped on pile of bird seed that had spilled out of a broken bag at a local Fred Meyer. On my way to the floor to receive a narvicular fractures in both my hands I sort of took-out a display at the end of the aisle. Before I could even assess the damage I was set apron by security and escorted outside where I was informed that if I ever set foot in the store again they would call the cops.

While in the emergency room later they refused to treat me until i filled out reams of paperwork. I told them that it's pretty hard for me to do that seeing as how I had just broke the hand I write with for sure, and suspected my other one of probably being broke as well. I eventually -painfully- filled the paperwork out and I was able to get treated.

I called the store in question to get a hold of someone to let them know what happen and to find out how to get them to pay for my medical bills only to find them singing a different tune. I supposedly went crazy in the store and vandalized a display. Then when security was called I ran out the front of the store, only to trip and fall in the street, breaking my hands conveniently off of the store property.

I was 17, living on my own, no insurance and had no chance at fighting with the store, so I never did.

Reminds me of the K-Mart in Santa Maria (CA). An elderly woman got mugged in the parking lot last year and had her purse stolen. She went back in to the "service" desk and asked to use the phone to call the police (explaining why) and the idiot told her that those phones weren't for customer use & that they "didn't dial out anyway" (lie).

Thank Godd for cameras. My younger brother got jumped by two loss prevention personal.They thought he was stealing shaving cream. He kicked the shit out of both! Any way they called for re-inforcements and the police. The police was wise enough to take a look at the store's camera and determine that the l.p gang assulted my brother. He wrote up a report stating he saw the whole incedent on camera and my brother was not doing any thing wrong. K-mart settledd out of court with my bro. Oh yea he still shops at k-mart!

@DWMILLER:

In the hopes of winning another settlement? : ) I would!!!

I'm betting that employee who gave the bandages to the customer got fired for "improper use" of merchandise or something.

Something similar happened to me a CompUSA a few years ago. I cut myself on some packaging in the store, went to ask for a band-aid, and was told "Sorry, we can't give you one, because then we'd open ourself up to liability."

I have no clue why they would think that a medical malpractice suit would be their main worry.

Can't blame them for trying to cover their asses as so many people are looking for ways to file suit against anybody, anywhere. But you're right... a band aid, for crying out loud?! You don't need the pharmacy for that.

@uberbucket: Welcome to America!