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Ng Hiu Man v Trade In Asia Ltd

Judgment Cited authorities 6 Cited in Precedent Map Related
Vincent
Judgment Date15 May 2017
Year2017
Judgement NumberDCPI2640/2013
Subject MatterPersonal Injuries Action
CourtDistrict Court (Hong Kong)
DCPI2640/2013 NG HIU MAN v. TRADE IN ASIA LTD

DCPI 2640/2013

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

PERSONAL INJURIES ACTION NO 2640 OF 2013

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BETWEEN
NG HIU MAN Plaintiff
and
TRADE IN ASIA LIMITED Defendant

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Before: Deputy District Judge Michael Liu in Court
Dates of Hearing: 7 to 11 December 2015
Date of Judgment: 15 May 2017

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JUDGMENT

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BACKGROUND

1. This is a claim for damages for personal injury brought by the plaintiff Miss Ng Hiu Man who says that she was injured on 28 July 2011 (Thursday) in the course of her employment with the defendant company as an assistant merchandiser. The plaintiff was born on 29 January 1985 and aged 26 at the time of the alleged accident. She was 30 years of age at the time of the trial of this action and is now 32 years of age.

2. Both liability and quantum of damages are disputed by the defendant. Insofar as liability is concerned, the main issue between the parties are whether there was any accident happened on 28 July 2011 (Thursday) as alleged by the plaintiff. The defendant does not accept there was any accident as alleged by the plaintiff since the defendant was not told by the plaintiff that she was injured at work until 2 August 2011 (Tuesday), ie 5 days after the alleged accident. Insofar as quantum is concerned, it is the defendant’s case that: the plaintiff should be liable for contributory negligence of no less than 50%; the plaintiff’s injuries are not as serious as what she asserted; and the plaintiff’s sick leave should be no more than one month.

3. At the trial of this case, only the plaintiff herself gave evidence in support of her claim. None of her former colleagues were called to give evidence to corroborate her case. On the other hand, the defendant denies that there was any accident happened to the plaintiff as alleged or at all. The defendant asserts that there was no eye-witness to the alleged accident and it criticizes the plaintiff for not calling any of her colleagues to give evidence in support of her case. The defendant said that it would be calling four witnesses to refute the plaintiff’s claim. The four witnesses that the defendant originally intended to call were: Ms Lee Wai Yi, Kitty (李慧儀) (DW1), Ms Chan Si Man, Vanessa (陳思敏) (DW2), Ms Lui Wai Fong, Sally (呂惠芳) (DW3), and Mr Sin Lai Chung, Kasper (冼禮忠). However, on the first day of the trial, Mr Daniel Chan, counsel for the defendant, informed this court that Mr Sin Lai Chung, Kasper was no longer in the employ of the defendant and that he could not be located for service on him the witness subpoena. As a result, only the other three witnesses were called to give evidence on behalf of the defendant.

4. Of the three witnesses called to give evidence for the defendant, Ms Kitty Lee (DW1) is said to be the Shipping Supervisor (運務部主管) of the Shipping Department of the defendant; Ms Vanessa Chan (DW2) says she worked in the same department as the plaintiff as a Merchandiser (採購員); and Ms Sally Lui (DW3) says that at the time of the alleged accident she was the secretary to the Chief Executive Office of the defendant.

ON LIABILITY

The accident - as alleged by the plaintiff

5. According to the plaintiff, the defendant had two offices situated in Po Lung Centre (“the PLC Office”) and Skyline Tower (宏天廣場) (“the SLT Office”), both in the Kowloon Bay District, Hong Kong, respectively. The PLC Office of the defendant housed the defendant’s Accounting Department (會計部) and Merchandising Department (採購部) whilst the SLT Office housed the offices of its boss and the Design Department (設計部).

6. The plaintiff says that the accident happened at about 2:30 pm on 28 July 2011 when she was holding and moving a carton box of price tags from its original position on a bench desk near the main entrance of the PLC Office with a view to placing it on the L-shape desk of a semi-enclosed workstation located further inside the PLC Office. Her left foot stumbled over a box of garment samples placed on the floor under the said L-shape desk on her left with a part of the box protruding into the aisle or passageway between two rows of writing desks. As a result, the plaintiff lost her balance, dropped the carton box of price tags, fell to her left side or backward with her left waist or low back hitting against the desk though she managed to stop herself from falling further onto the floor by supporting her body with both hands resting against the desktop on her left.

7. The plaintiff further says that the dimensions of the subject box containing garment samples placed on the floor under the desk were about 18 inches in length, 12 inches in width and 10 inches in height. Its weight was about 7 to 8 kilograms. In so far as the carton box containing price tags is concerned, it measured about 12 inches in length, 6 inches in width and 6 inches in height. Its weight was about 4 to 5 kilograms. According to the plaintiff, this carton box together with about five other carton boxes containing garment samples and price tags were delivered by courier or delivery workers to the PLC Office earlier on the same day of the accident on 28 July 2011. They were placed on the bench desk near the main entrance of the PLC Office temporarily. In order not to cause obstruction to the area in the vicinity of the bench desk near the main entrance, the plaintiff intended to move these 6 carton boxes to the said L-shape desk located further inside the PLC Office so that she could work on the price tags and distribute the relevant garment samples to the responsible merchandisers for them to take follow-up actions. The plaintiff claims that the accident happened and she stumbled over the aforesaid box of garment samples when she was holding with her hands one of the carton boxes containing price tags against her chest and had just walked past such part of the PLC Office where a strip of office space was used as a passageway with large amount of boxes, files, documents, rolls of fabrics, garment samples, etc being placed or stacked up on the two sides of such passageway leaving an aisle of about 4 feet in width.

8. The plaintiff ascribed the alleged accident to the negligence of the defendant in the following aspects:-

(1) the defendant failed to ensure that there was sufficient space in the PLC Office that could be used as storage for storing the fabric rolls, garment samples, garment accessories, documents, labels, price tags, etc. It is the plaintiff’s case that the PLC Office was not a large one. It was rectangular in shape with an estimated floor area of about 1,500 square feet only and that there was no store room or warehouse in the PLC Office;

(2) the defendant failed to ensure that there were sufficient and proper equipment such as storage racks and cabinets for storing the aforesaid items;

(3) the defendant failed to ensure that items placed on the floor, desk tops, underneath the desks, etc were being kept in an appropriate and orderly manner without causing any obstruction to the passageways or aisles in the PLC Office or becoming a danger to staff walking around within the PLC Office;

(4) the defendant failed to designate any person to supervise and ensure that the aforesaid items were placed or stored in the PLC Office in an appropriate and orderly manner; and

(5) the defendant failed to give any warning or notice to its staff members to remind them of the danger of tripping by those items lying on the floor.

9. In support of the plaintiff’s claim, her solicitors had prepared a floor plan showing the general layout of the PLC Office and attached it to the plaintiff’s witness statement as “Enclosure 3”. There is not much difference between the parties on the general layout of the PLO Office. In fact, the plaintiff’s floor plan is very similar to the floor plan prepared on behalf of the defendant and attached to the witness statement of DW2 as “Enclosure VC-1”. In addition to “Enclosure 3”, the plaintiff also attached to her witness statement four photographs as “Enclosure 4”. These photographs show that large amount of fabric rolls, plastic bags containing garment accessories and some loose fabric samples were lying on the floor in the open area in the vicinity of the bench desk near the main entrance, whilst large amount of loose documents and miscellaneous items were seen to have been placed in a rather disorderly manner on top of a large number of carton boxes that were stacked up to a height taller than the partition boards used for separating individual work stations. According to the plaintiff, these photographs were taken by her and her colleague Isabel on 27 May 2011 on the instructions of their senior for the reference of their boss who was then considering merging the PLC Office and the SLT Office into one and was assessing how much space was needed for housing all the files, documents, fabric rolls, etc. The plaintiff confirmed that the general condition of the PLC Office at the time of the alleged accident on 28 July 2011, in particular concerning the open area and the passageway in the office, were the same as shown in the photographs.

The plaintiff alleged that her colleagues knew the occurrence of the alleged accident

10. It is common ground that the defendant had ten employees working in the PLC Office at the material time of the alleged accident. They included Elgi, Grace, Isabel, Kasper (the manager and supervisor of the plaintiff), Kitty (the Shipping Supervisor), Stephen (also the manager and supervisor of the plaintiff), Tony, Vanessa, Zoe, and the plaintiff.

11. According to the plaintiff, though she and...

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