Tips to Protect Your Small Business From Lawsuits

If you’re a business owner, you probably do whatever you can to limit risk. However, nobody can control everything, including the possibility of facing a lawsuit.

However, you can take some actions to protect your company from facing a lawsuit, including:

Prevent Accidents

One thing that can lead to your business being sued is personal injuries. For example, let’s say you own a grocery store. A wet floor that’s allowed to stay wet for too long could lead to someone slipping, falling and seriously injuring themselves. The next thing you know, you’re facing a personal injury lawsuit.

Do your best to make sure your business is safe at all times to prevent lawsuits. You might want to invest in appropriate employee trainings to ensure they know the rules and regulations they need to abide by to stay safe.

Watch What You Do and Say

When you conduct business, you as well as your employees need to be careful when making public statements so they’re not interpreted as slanderous or libelous. In addition, if you do business with potentially unscrupulous people, even when you behave well, could lead to you getting sued.

You as well as your employees need to attempt to avoid conflicts of interest. If it even appears like a conflict of interest exists, your business’ reputation could be damaged and you could get in legal trouble. As an example, if you’re a member of the city council and you help to pass an ordinance which benefits your business, this would be a clear conflict of interest even if your vote wasn’t cast with your own benefit in mind.

Make Sure Your Reputation Is Protected

Reputation is vital for businesses. Deal with competitors, customers, employees and the community in an upstanding manner. Do something if you say you’ll do it. Keep your promises. Don’t misrepresent your capabilities, products or business. Don’t bend any rules. Don’t do things that can harm your business, leading to lost business, mistrust and possible lawsuits. Act with integrity and honesty in order to lay a solid foundation for the success of your business.

Properly Maintain Safety Equipment

Whether you’re running a brick-and-mortar store, managing a fleet of delivery trucks, or operating a construction business, it’s crucial to maintain your safety equipment. Failing to do so, could result in a lawsuit. For example, if a delivery company neglects routine inspections on one of its vehicles, it increases the risk of brake failures or other mechanical issues. This could result in a car accident lawsuit, which is the last thing you want for your business.

To reduce liability, create a strict maintenance schedule for safety equipment and company vehicles. Make sure your employees know how to diagnose and report potential hazards before a malfunction results in disaster.

Maintain Cybersecurity

The majority of businesses extensively use computers. This means you need to take steps needed to protect data from hackers. This, for example, means installing security software like antivirus and keeping it updated.

If your computer system is brought down by a virus or hacker, it could lead to you not being able to perform work that you’re contractually obligated to do by a deadline. Key files could get stolen or lost, and this could lead to a lawsuit from suppliers or clients whose data got leaked.

Ensure you backup your data in case technology breaks down.