A tort is a damage that is done intentionally or unintentionally to a person or property of another person. The two categories of torts are the negligence torts and the intentional torts (Aaron, 2000). Negligence is the most dominant action in tort. This is the kind of tort that provides actions that lead to damages or to relief that is injunctive, which in each case is structured to protect legal rights including those of personal safety, intangible economic interests and even property Negligence torts will arise from cases like motor accidents, personal injury of various types and worker negligence. Intentional torts include things like illegal occupation of land, public nuisance that causes irritability, defamation, trespass or even giving wrongful information. This paper is going to look at the various forms of torts and regulatory risks that a company can face and come up with various ways in which the company can minimize the torts and regulatory risks
Common Torts that can be Found in A Company
One of the most common torts that can be found on a general company is the statutory tort which imposes duties on parties whether public or private. Manufacturers are known to be the bets in avoiding costs and in the process they end up creating defective products that may be injurious to the consumers. This means there must be a product liability to protect the consumers by ensuring that companies that produce defective products are made to pay for the damages (Salanie, 2003). The other tort is nuisance which can be construed to be an activity or situation that is harmful to the general public, harm caused by such an activity and the legal liability that emanates from the aforementioned conditions. Activities that are bothersome include indecent behavior, objectionable odors, obnoxious decibel levels and dirty conditions. The laws that cover nuisance are meant to cushion people from conditions that may interfere with their rights by ensuring that people who default on the established nuisance laws are made to pay for it. If a company dumps garbage on a place that distracts the general public, then it is liable to pay damages under the nuisance tort.
The same applies if a company is emitting high levels of noise that disturbs the people in the adjacent habitats (Nugget, 2009). Trespass or any other action that prevents someone from enjoying his personal property is treated under nuisance. Defamation is another serious tort that involves the tarnishing of reputation of someone or a company. There are two types of defamation. The first one is slander which is oral defamation and libel which is defamation in print or broadcast. If a company or an officer representative make a factual assertion about an individual, a group, persons or another company without reliable evidence, then that is a tort and people and companies especially media companies have been made to pay money amounting to hundreds of millions of shillings after being found guilty of defamation. Other dignitary torts that are related to defamation and can affect a company include abuse of process, malicious prosecution and privacy invasion.
If a company involves itself in intentional acts whose harm can be foreseen then that can be referred to as an intentional tort. These torts include mistreatment, assault, and intentional infliction of emotional stress, fraud and wrongful imprisonment. Conversion and trespass can also qualify under this tort (Harper, 2007).
Economic torts are the one that protect people from interference with their trade of entrepreneurship.
Sometimes, during the process of business, some people or companies can interfere with the operation of others. Some companies like the telecommunication companies are known to hire goons to vandalize their equipment or cables while others create uncondusive atmosphere where rival companies cannot do business well. In this case such businesses are protected by the economic torts. Finally, there is the competition law which is an important method of regulation of how businesses conduct themselves in the market. The market can be abused by monopolists thus creating an uncondusive environment for the others. Sometimes, mergers and acquisitions can lead to lessened competition or a lopsided market economy and the private damage actions torts are sometimes applied to curtail some of these conducts that are anti competitive.
Strategies for minimizing tort and regulatory risks
In the business environment today, companies must be active in development, maintenance and follow up on an action that is preventative and corrective and applicable to the business model of the company. The companies must be ready to contend with a wide variety of regulatory risks that include tort liability because failure to comply can have a negative impact on the assets, reputation and even the balance sheet of the company. One of the way in which companies can minimize these risks is by allocating internal resources to implement existing plans of action using preventative measures that provide intrinsic controls of the daily running of the business operations that reduce the exposure to tort liability, criminal penalties and fines (Loman, 2000).
The organizations should start with identifying the tort risks that involve non compliance because they are the most dangerous and end up damaging the reputation of the company. These elements of non compliance include defamation, anti trust violations and economic torts. The companies should also look at the way in which its operations can pose risks to the safety of its workers and the entire public and ensure that the possible dangers are mitigated in order to avoid the tort liability that emanate from such kind of nuisance. The companies should also ensure that they desist from engaging in activities that can be ranked under intentional tort violation like emotionally stressing the workers or the neighboring population or even assault cases (Fillebrown, 2000). This can be made possible through the strengthening of the public relations meaning that if there is good relationship between the company and the internal and the external population, such tort liabilities will be avoided.
Instead of companies being a nuisance to the public and an enemy to the law which often brings in some tort risks and unnecessary liabilities, they should aim at reducing these regulatory risks by operating within the framework of respect and decency. Involvement in corporate social responsibility is a sure way in which a company can reduce regulatory risks and torts. Most of the tort liabilities emanate from the companys relation with the adjacent environment and populations and a company that engages itself in acts of corporate social activity will by default find itself treating its internal and external population and environment with the deserved respect meaning that it will cut down incidences of nuisance that can lead to regulatory risks and tort liabilities.
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