Handing Out Vehicles Without Driving Record Reviews Can Cost You
“Negligent entrustment” is a legal term that means you trusted someone with something that was dangerous, and you knew or should have known better than to trust that person. Under this theory, you will be liable for the damage which that person caused because you gave the dangerous item to him or her. For construction companies, this liability is a problem with company vehicles entrusted to supervisory personnel. Several cases illustrate this principle.
In 1994, an employee driving a company vehicle was found to have a less-than-desirable driving record. Although not the sole cause of the accident, the company ended up settling for $2,600,000 because of a negligent entrustment action asserted against the company.