Stone pebble in Take Out Food

[E.R-Murillo]

Jurisdiction

New York

Six days ago I bought Mexican takeout and ate half of it at home saving the rest for another day. Yesterday I decided to finish the leftovers. When I bit into the food, I bit down on something really hard that caused immediate pain. I spit the food out into a napkin and when I looked there was a small stone. I had pain the rest of the evening and now the next day, today, I still have pain, but don't see any outside damage to my teeth. I am seeing the dentist to have them check it out and if my insurance doesn't cover it, I wanted to know what recourse I have against the restaurant. I kept the stone, but unfortunately after finding the stone I threw out the remaining food and had already thrown out the receipt the day I purchased the food.

 

[Zigner]

Six days ago I bought Mexican takeout and ate half of it at home saving the rest for another day. Yesterday I decided to finish the leftovers. When I bit into the food, I bit down on something really hard that caused immediate pain. I spit the food out into a napkin and when I looked there was a small stone. I had pain the rest of the evening and now the next day, today, I still have pain, but don't see any outside damage to my teeth. I am seeing the dentist to have them check it out and if my insurance doesn't cover it, I wanted to know what recourse I have against the restaurant. I kept the stone, but unfortunately after finding the stone I threw out the remaining food and had already thrown out the receipt the day I purchased the food.

What did the restaurant say when you mentioned this to them?
I doubt you will have much success outside of what the restaurant may offer in compensation.

 

[zddoodah]

if my insurance doesn't cover it

I obviously don't know the details of your dental insurance coverage, but there's no reason to think this wouldn't be covered, although you may have a co-pay and/or deductible.

I wanted to know what recourse I have against the restaurant.

You should contact the restaurant and inform it what happened. You would have a claim for any uncovered medical/dental expense (i.e., your co-pay/deductible). Whether the restaurant or insurer resists the claim based on the evidence is impossible to predict.

 

[adjusterjack]

Agree. Report it to the restaurant owner, in writing, but expect pushback.

 

[welkin]

I had pain the rest of the evening and now the next day, today, I still have pain, but don't see any outside damage to my teeth. I am seeing the dentist to have them check it out and if my insurance doesn't cover it, I wanted to know what recourse I have against the restaurant.

Pain is a relative thing. There is pain and there is discomfort. Perhaps you should have waited a few days before scheduling an appointment with the dentist as you say that you didn't see any damage to your tooth. You may have created an expense unnecessarily that now you are concerned about recovering.

The problem with a situation like this is that you have a hard time proving that whatever was in the food was because of negligence on the part of the vender. On the other hand, if what you bit down on was piece of bone in ground meat or something else that might not be a pebble, the vender may have just offered you a free meal.

 

[stealthy1]

Pain is a relative thing. There is pain and there is discomfort. Perhaps you should have waited a few days before scheduling an appointment with the dentist as you say that you didn't see any damage to your tooth. You may have created an expense unnecessarily that now you are concerned about recovering.

I'm also wondering if you took an OTC pain-killer?

 

[Zigner]

The OP is talking about food he bought almost a week ago (at the time of posting). He's going to have a VERY tough time showing that the foreign object wasn't introduced while the OP was in control of the food.