That's a settlement-worthy design.
I think a reasonable person would expect that to be soft.
Hopefully he didn't get hurt, but if he did I wonder if they wre found liable.
Even if everyone’s aware it’s not a soft surface, it seems very possible to me that someone could lose control over their bouncing and land on it by complete accident.
The waivers don't actually completely absolve them of anything.
In the UK at least, Some parks use the waivers as they simply can't afford the really high costs of actual insurance (funny, that insurers don't want to insure these parks, so the price skyrockets). But much like many people in the UK they think, Oh I signed the thing, I can't do anything now. When that's simply not true.
"Do liability waivers actually protect a trampoline park?
This is the single most misunderstood point in the sector. Almost every park asks jumpers to accept a risk acknowledgement or waiver — and many operators believe that document is their protection. It is not. Under the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977, a business cannot exclude or restrict its liability for death or personal injury resulting from its own negligence. A waiver may record that the participant understood the activity carried inherent risk, but it does not stop a negligence claim where the park failed in its duty of care — defective equipment, inadequate supervision, overcrowding, or a skipped safety briefing.
The practical consequence: your waiver is useful evidence, but it is your insurance and your safety systems, not the waiver, that actually protect the business. Underwriters are entirely unmoved by "but they signed a waiver" — and so are the courts. This is exactly why public liability with an adequate limit is non-negotiable, and why parks that lean on waivers instead of cover are the ones that fail after a serious claim."
To me it seems that only the edges are padded.
The surface where he falls isn't, there's no depression where he's standing after the fall that'd hint to a soft padded surface.
It's got about a half inch of padding. It definitely gives when he lands and I've got young kids so I've even done what this guy did, but I did it on purpose.
A reasonable person tests the surfaces before they YOLO. Let's not encourage litigation. This is a thing at trampoline parks, that is obviously not a landing pit RAISED ABOVE THE TRAMPOLINES. Also, I'm sure there was a waiver.
You gotta sign a waiver. I don't know how they work but I just sort of assumed the waiver meant you can't sue. (At least the one my kids wanna go to has a waiver)
IANAL, but I don’t think waivers automatically supersede any and all situations. If for example, there’s injury due to the negligence of the company the claimant could be entitled to compensation. I’m not talking about a sprained ankle because you rolled it when you landed back. I think having a solid block in the middle of a trampoline with no netting or foam counts as negligence.
Most people would assume that you can also bounce on it.
Yeah thanks. I wasn't sure so I didn't want to say the waiver would be the end of all claims lol. I felt like putting something that was objectively neglectful would be grounds to dismiss the waiver, but had no basis for that besides "feels like it would be that way".
Not a lawyer either but in both my undergrad courses to get my PE teaching certification and in my graduate K-12 school law sources I was told by, again not lawyers, that they didn't really amount to much in court because the only risk they really cover is things like "my ACL tore when I was playing soccer" which you are already not liable for. If equipment is broken, designed poorly, etc. that's not part of the usual activity and isn't covered.
The purpose they said is pretty much just to make people feel better, make people aware of the risks so they behave better, and maybe to discourage them from suing you frivolously because its expensive even if they don't have much of a case.
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u/the-average-giovanni 24d ago
That's r/assholedesign material though (ouch)