An elderly woman who was bowled over by a trolley and fractured her hip during a buying spree at a Victorian Aldi store is now suing the supermarket giant.
The 73-year-old Geelong woman, who wishes to remain anonymous, was injured during a “special buys” sale at the Corio supermarket in August last year.
After being hit by a trolley during the mad rush for a discounted television, she fell to the ground and injured her hip – which later needed surgery. She has now decided to take legal action due to subsequent health issues from the incident, including ongoing trochanteric bursitis, depression and anxiety.
In a statement of claim supplied to the Country Court of Victoria, the injured woman’s lawyers said Aldi failed to control the crowd and allowed customers to use trolleys in a dangerous or careless manner when trying to obtain a large television that was on sale at the store.
Principal Jodie Harris of Arnold Thomas and Becker Lawyers, who is representing the injured woman, told NCA NewsWire on Monday that there was no security outside and no one seeking to control the entry once the doors opened.
“The doors opened and there was a bit of a rush of some people going in, and my client was hit with a trolley by another customer and she fell to the ground in front of everyone else who was trying to enter,” Ms Harris said.
“There was one other customer who did assist her, but there weren’t any Aldi staff there who were providing any assistance at all.”
The injured woman allegedly suffered an intracapsular fracture of the neck of the left femur, as well as her other ongoing conditions due to the incident.
Ms Harris said Aldi had ultimately failed in their duty of care when preparing to sell large items at a sale price, like televisions.
“If you are going to promote something heavily, you’re wanting to drive crowds to your store to pick up those particular items, you want the interest level to be high,” she said.
“If you’re doing that, then an obligation falls upon you to manage the number of people, because there’s only limited amounts available.
“People are keen to try and get it, emotions run high, and people are trying to get in before everyone else, and that creates a situation where it is foreseeable that someone could sustain an injury in those circumstances.
“If that’s foreseeable, then Aldi has an obligation to have a system in place to manage those crowds.”
Aldi has been declining to comment on the incident to media.
Aldi has been having these sales regularly, how can you control the crowd, it’s like Black Friday sales..
Sue, Sue Sue, what a crock of nonsense…
You cannot do anything these days and you get sued for everything..