A receipt at the restaurant shows a person having a drink or two. A few hours later, the customer is involved in a serious traffic collision. If an attorney is investigating possible dram shop liability the receipt can be used as evidence. The receipt is not required to prove that the restaurant served a clearly intoxicated customer or that the employees failed to follow proper procedures. What transpired during the time between drinks orders might be more relevant.
In order to understand this sequence it is essential to consider alcohol service as a hospitality operation, not only counting beverages after an event.
Receipts are evidence of a sale but not the customer’s condition.
Records at the point-of-sale can show the date and time of transactions, what beverages were purchased, as well as what charges were assigned to a tab.
A receipt cannot reveal how a client behaved when they were served a drink. It’s often difficult to establish who drank the drinks, especially if they were shared, or what the bartender noticed.
An expert witness who is qualified will help lawyers interpret the records, along with surveillance footage, employee testimony as well as any other evidence available. The objective is to reconstruct the sequence of service and not assume that every purchase tells all the story.
What are the things employees can actually observe?
The central question in most alcohol-related disputes is whether the staff members had reasonable grounds to believe that the patron was intoxicated. These could be evidence of impaired coordination, strange speaking problems, inability to maintain equilibrium or observable behavioral changes.
But these indicators require the context. A single act recorded on surveillance footage may provide an explanation that is not connected to alcohol consumption. Investigators should consider the camera’s angle, the recording quality, employee position, and the extent to which a particular behaviour was observed by staff.
Preston Rideout brings experience as Bar manager, bartender general manager of nightclubs, and director of bar operations to these reviews. The operational knowledge he has gained helps him make connections between the duties and limitations of employees who work in busy hospitality environments.
Written Training Doesn’t Always Describe Real Practice
The majority of alcohol-related investigations revolve around inquiries about preparation of employees. Does the establishment offer the seller-servers training for its employees? Did employees learn to spot the signs of intoxication? Management was clear on the reasons for refusing to provide additional services?
These questions are central to Responsible alcohol service service, but reviewing training certificates alone may not answer them.
The venue may have policies that are in place, but they fail to implement them consistently. In the other case an employee might have complied with the rules of service even if the incident was tragic.
An operational review will look at documents for training, testimony from employees, management oversight, and the actions that were recorded during the incident. Both plaintiffs and defense attorneys are able to benefit from a distinction between the existence of an policy and its actual implementation.
Timeline often sheds light on important questions
Imagine a person being served drinks by various bartenders on a busy evening. It’s possible that the initial employee noticed a regular manner of conduct. Following a shift switch another bartender might have served a different beverage. The manager may intervened following the shift change.
These decisions may appear as an ongoing process even if the timeline has not been recreated. Examining all the information, including transaction records and schedules of staffing, as well surveillance footage and incident reports together can help clarify who knew when and what. Records that are missing or not complete should be identified rather than replaced with speculation.
The legal liability issues and practice in the industry are distinct.
Hospitality professionals can explain and determine if a location adheres to the accepted operating procedures.
They do not replace the courts’ responsibility to determine the legal responsibility. There are various laws for each state on the legal responsibility of retailers selling alcohol.
Rideout Hospitality Consulting assists plaintiff and defendant lawyers across the United States with case review, analysis of operations, written opinions, and depositions. The company’s focus is on alcohol-related decisions and staff training.
The most robust analysis explains what the Evidence Cannot Show
The seriousness of an alcohol-related incident is not able to determine all previous facts.
Attorneys need to understand the available records, the limitations of the records and the way employees were expected to operate under the circumstances.
An exhaustive analysis of hospitality practices will discern between documented and preconceived behaviours and show which practices of the place are in line with or differ from accepted standards. The courts can then evaluate the actual circumstances rather than relying solely on what they learned later.