Manuel has a huge presentation at work and wants to impress his boss. He stops o

Question

Manuel has a huge presentation at work and wants to impress his boss. He stops off at Chipper, the local coffee house, on his way to work to get a caffeine jolt. When the barista tries to hand Manuel his double caramel mocha, she accidentally drops the drink on the counter, splashing coffee on him and causing serious burns. Manuel doesn’t have time to change (or seek medical attention), and is forced to rush to work and do his presentation wearing a coffee stained shirt. Manuel is so distracted by this ordeal that he delivers a terrible presentation and is fired. Manuel is unable to find another job, he falls into a deep depression, and his wife leaves him. Identify Chipper’s liability (and any possible defenses) for any legal issues presented by these facts.

Sherry is the chief executive officer and founder of Sherry’s Southern Cosmetics, Inc. Sherry must decide whether to market a cosmetic product that might have undesirable side effects for a small percentage of users. How should Sherry decide whether to sell the product? How does the standard of ethics that is applied affect this answer?

Explanation / Answer

The Coffee shop owed its customers a liability of reasonable care, which it failed to exercise causing its customers the burns. The barista was expected to exercise reasonable care while handing over the coffee, which she failed to do due to negligence and spilled the coffee on the customer causing him burns. The Chippers has liability based on fault, for which it may have to compensate Manuel for the financial and emotional losses incurred due to the event in addition to the medical expenses for the burns.

Before selling the cosmetics to the customers, Sherry should devise a testing procedure to be adopted for enabling the users to test-use the cosmetics at the point of sale only and check for side effects. The cosmetic should be sold only after it clears the test on that particular person. For the places where this testing procedure can not be followed, each customer should be given a pre use test procedure booklet to check at home, if the product causes side effects, before using it. If it does, it should be taken back by the company and refund issued immediately.

By adopting these practices, the company will be able to build a goodwill among the customers. The ethics applied to the case relate to the well being of the customers and only offering those products that are beneficial for them. It might result in few refunds and missed sales, but in long run it will establish the company as an ethically run organisation.

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