Buljat v Coles Supermarkets Australia Pty Ltd

The appellant, Ms Buljat, appealed to the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of the Australian Capital Territory against findings of liability and damages made by the primary judge in her personal injury claim against Coles Supermarkets Australia Pty Ltd. Ms Buljat had slipped and fallen in a Coles supermarket after stepping on a grape, sustaining injuries.

The central legal issues before the Court of Appeal were whether the primary judge erred in finding that Coles did not breach its duty of care to Ms Buljat, and whether the primary judge erred in assessing damages, particularly in relation to the appellant's subsequent development of deep vein thrombosis. The appeal focused on the adequacy of Coles' system for inspecting and cleaning its supermarket floors to prevent hazards like fallen grapes.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal on the issue of liability, finding that Coles had breached its duty of care. The court reasoned that Coles' "clean as you go" system, which relied on all staff to identify hazards incidentally during their duties without dedicated hazard-spotting staff or timed inspections, was insufficient to constitute reasonable care. The court noted that the store manager acknowledged past incidents of customers falling on grapes and that grapes were a common item for slips. However, the court upheld the primary judge's decision regarding damages, limiting them to the date of discovery of the deep vein thrombosis, as it was not established that the fall caused the thrombosis, and extending liability due to the appellant's subsequent hypochondria was not warranted.