girl fell from my horse can she sue me

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sundance2004

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my dads freinds daughter came down the yard today and fell from my horse, she seemed ok, little shocked but i am concerend that they may try and claim off me. i have my horse covered and rider insurance myself but doubt this will respond. would appreciate ppls views. i might just be worrying over nothing but it has rung home that i will now not be allowing anyone but myself on my horse
 
If you have insurance with a decent company ( Not E&L, equine and Livestock or any of the aliases used by those cowboys) then you are covered for whoever rides your own horse. So if they try to sue you you simply gicve them the phone number of your insurance company and leave them to it. You wilol also have a legal helpline with a decent insurance company so you can actually phone them up and ask them.
 
surely people ride on an own risk basis?? what is the world coming to???
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I am assuming you did not charge her to ride your horse or offer to give her a lesson so cannot imagine how you can be blamed unless you knowingly allowed a beginner to ride a non-novice horse.
 
I won't let anyone ride mine now unless I know their exact level of experience. I had a lady start to share my daughter's TB who has always been an absolute gentleman and a saint apart from getting a bit excited when jumping and giving the odd buck after a jump. Things went well for a number of weeks, the lady had owned quite a difficult horse previously and gelled with the TB immediately. However..... my husband and I went on holiday and while we were away the lady and her partner brought their large dogs down which the horses were not used to, they locked them in one of the stables but were evidently barking loudly. The lady rode the TB in high winds, decided to jump and her partner took some flash photos. The TB eventually decided that he was a bit stressed with all this and as her partner took a flash photo while she jumped he spooked and bucked. She actually threw herself off (the lady said she thought as she was falling it had perhaps been a bad idea but she had thrown herself off before when her horse bucked) and broke her arm badly. She is just getting back to normal five months later. I felt really bad as he has always been a good boy. My neighbour watched it all and when I got back from holiday told me everything that had happened (the lady told me that he bucked after the jump and then admitted to the flash photo and the fact that the dogs were there but didn't realise that he was wound up) and said that in no way was the horse to blame, he'd just had enough (evidently the wind was so bad it was blowing the jump wings over). He also hadn't jumped for several months which she was aware of and if I had been there I would have advised her to start off with trotting pole and build up. She realised that he had done it because of their actions, my neighbour said he would speak up if any other action was taken but it left me really rattled. The same horse has just had 8 weeks off due to the weather and my daughter got on today and he was like an old plod, didn't put a foot wrong. I think the lady just didn't anticipate the consequence of all the different factors on the day!
 
Ok, what if someone went to ride a horse that 'had a bit of a buck', as they were threatening to send it to the sales and the viewer was trying to help rehome it, said horse actually did a lot more including broncs and ramming rider against side rails of fencing. Then, whilst awaiting ambulance after the trialling, owner confesses she won't ride it again as it broke her ankle badly,and that other rider had taken a bad fall and been put in hospital a month previous.
So the person is injured whilst trying a horse known to buck but without any knowledge of earlier injuries to riders. At which point is an owner negligent, knowing others have been injured by this horse but allowing other riders to try it without informing them of previous issues?
Ride at own risk is true enough, but I wonder what you think of these circumstances?
 
I would say that was not fair at all, you should have been told the whole history, the owner had no thought for your wellbeing. What would she have done if the horse had been damaged instead of you? Bet she wouldn't have been so happy then. I had a mare years ago that really knocked my confidence, and having had horses for 40+ years that took some doing. My lovely friends helped me no end and indeed rode the horse for me and got it going again, we still didn't gel and I sold her as a brood mare but I wouldn't have dreamt of letting anyone ride her without being aware of the risks.
 
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