商品之通常使用、可期待之合理使用及被害人與有過失之判斷

The Determination of the Ordinary and the Expectably Reasonable Use of Products and the Victim’s Contributory Negligence

There is a concurrent relationship between the “product liability” law under Taiwan’s Consumer Protection Act and the “product manufacturer’s liability” law under the Civil Code. There two in turn form the “dual-track regulatory system”. The element of product manufacturer’s liability under Article 191-1, Paragraph 1, is that “the product manufacturer is liable for the damage caused by the ordinary use or consumption of products”. In practice, owing to the allocation of the burden of proof, the victim bears the burden of proving her damage is caused by the “ordinary use” of products. Therefore, the primary issue of product manufacturer’s liability lies on whether the victim is harmed due to her ordinary use or consumption of products. In addition, pursuant to Article 5 of the Enforcement Rules of the Consumer Protection Act, the expectably reasonable use of products is one of the statutorily delineated determining factors of whether the products lack safety. This Article plans to discuss the correlations in applications among the “expectably reasonable use of products” under the Consumer Protection Act, the “causation of the ordinary use or consumption of products” and the victim’s contributory negligence.