A brand-new Occupiers Liability Act provision requires Notice to be given by a person injured by ice or snow on privately-owned property, within 60 days after the date of injury.
That Snow/Ice Injury Notice must describe in writing the location, date, time and circumstances giving rise to the injury. The Notice must either be sent by registered mail or else personally served upon an owner or occupier of the property (presumably including the manager, a director or officer of a condo). When applicable, such a Notice should be given to an independent contractor and any particular owner or resident of a unit when involved with removing snow or ice on the property.
These new Snow/Ice Injury Notice requirements received Royal Assent on December 8, 2020 but will not come into effect until proclaimed into law by the Lieutenant Governor. Since an injury caused by snow or ice is the only criteria to invoke this type of occupier’s liability claim, any kind of injury caused by snow or ice could be applicable – whether caused by a skidding automobile, falling ice or a slip and fall scenario.
If any owner, resident or guest serves a Snow/Ice Injury Notice upon your Corporation, consider whether you should in turn serve such a Notice upon your snow removal provider or other parties as a precaution (although, once the first Snow/Ice Injury Notice has been provided to any one of the parties, that 60-day limitation period restriction ceases to apply to any other party involved in a subsequent lawsuit).
If an injured party fails to give that Notice within the 60-day limitation period, they could expect to lose their legal right to recovery of monetary damages. However, that limitation period does not apply if the injured person were to die because of the injury. Also, a person demonstrating a reasonable excuse for failing to provide the Notice on time might be able to extend the limitation period where there was no adverse effect upon the defendant parties.
But watch out – in the case of a snow or ice “slip and fall” occurring upon municipal property, the right to sue the municipality is lost if the applicable Notice is not served upon the municipality within the 10-day limitation period after the date of the injury.