Ontario Slip and Fall Laws: Who Is Liable? (2026)

When you slip and fall in Ontario, the occupier of the premises owes you a statutory duty of reasonable care under the Occupiers' Liability Act, RSO 1990, c O.2. If snow or ice caused your fall, one rule can end your case before it begins: written notice must reach the occupier within 60 days of the injury.

Who Is Liable Under the Occupiers' Liability Act

Ontario's Occupiers' Liability Act (OLA) governs almost every slip-and-fall claim on private or commercial property in the province. The Act defines an "occupier" broadly: any person who is in physical possession of premises, or who has responsibility for and control over the condition of the premises, the activities carried on there, or the persons allowed to enter. In practice, occupiers include homeowners, commercial landlords, retailers, property management companies, and tenants who exercise control over a space.

Before the OLA came into force, Ontario courts classified visitors as invitees, licensees, or trespassers and applied different duties to each. The OLA abolished those categories and replaced them with a single statutory standard. Section 3(1) of the Act states that an occupier of premises owes a duty to take "such care as in all the circumstances of the case is reasonable to see that persons entering on the premises, and the property brought on the premises by those persons are reasonably safe while on the premises."

The duty applies equally to a customer entering a grocery store, a guest at a private residence, and a tradesperson arriving to do repair work. What is "reasonable" depends on the specific facts: the nature of the hazard, how long it existed, whether the occupier knew or should have known about it, and what steps it would have been practical to take to address it.

More than one person can be an occupier of the same premises at the same time. When a building owner leases space to a tenant, both the landlord and the tenant may owe the OLA duty depending on who exercises the relevant control. Identifying all occupiers is important when it comes to the snow-and-ice notice requirement discussed below.

The Standard of Care: What Reasonable Care Looks Like

Ontario courts assess whether an occupier met the reasonable-care standard by looking at the totality of the circumstances. Key factors include:

Knowledge of the hazard. An occupier who knew, or ought reasonably to have known, that a danger existed has a stronger obligation to address it. A wet floor that has been present for hours, an icy patch that forms every winter in the same spot, or a broken step that was reported to management all attract a higher duty of response.

Adequacy of inspections. A reasonable occupier carries out inspections of their premises at intervals that match the risk. A busy shopping centre entrance during a rainstorm requires more frequent checking than a quiet warehouse aisle on a dry day.

Promptness of remediation. Knowing about a hazard and failing to fix it, or to warn visitors of it, is the essence of a slip-and-fall negligence claim. Warnings must be adequate in placement and clarity; a small yellow pylon can be sufficient in some circumstances and wholly inadequate in others.

Property use and visitor characteristics. The foreseeable users of the premises matter. A long-term care facility that knows its residents use walkers must apply a higher standard of floor maintenance than a commercial loading dock where only trained workers are expected.

The OLA also allows an occupier to restrict or modify the statutory duty by express agreement, stipulation, or notice, provided the restriction is reasonable and brought to the attention of visitors (s. 3(3)). This is commonly seen in recreational facilities where waivers are signed. However, an occupier cannot exclude the duty to persons who have a legal right to enter, such as government inspectors.

Trespassers and Recreational Premises

The full "reasonably safe" duty under OLA s. 3 does not apply to trespassers or to persons who enter premises and willingly assume the risk of the activity. Section 4(1) of the OLA provides that where a person enters premises with the intention of committing a criminal act, or where a person willingly assumes the risk of a known danger, the occupier's duty is reduced to: (a) not creating a danger with the deliberate intent of doing harm to the person, and (b) not acting with reckless disregard of the presence of the person.

The reduced duty applies not only to uninvited trespassers but also to situations where an invited visitor voluntarily proceeds in the face of an obvious and known risk. Assumption of risk (volenti non fit injuria) is a factual question and courts do not find it lightly; the claimant must have had full knowledge of the nature and extent of the risk, not merely general awareness that the activity carried some danger.

Recreational trails, undeveloped land, and agricultural premises also receive modified treatment. Where premises are used for recreational purposes and no fee is charged for entry, occupiers are encouraged to open their land by exposure to a lower liability standard. Ontario courts have applied this principle to marked hiking trails, snowmobile routes crossing private farmland, and similar settings.

Snow and Ice Claims: The 60-Day Written Notice Rule

Ontario's harshest procedural trap for slip-and-fall claimants is the snow-and-ice notice requirement added to the OLA by the Occupiers' Liability Amendment Act, 2020 (SO 2020, c 33), which brought s. 6.1 into force on 29 January 2021.

Section 6.1 provides that no action may be brought for personal injury caused by snow or ice on premises unless, within 60 days after the occurrence of the injury, written notice of the claim is served on at least one of the following:

• the occupier of the premises; or
• an independent contractor employed by the occupier to remove snow or ice at the relevant time.

The notice must contain the date, time, and location of the occurrence. Delivery must be by personal service or registered mail. A text message, email, or verbal report to staff does not satisfy the requirement.

Section 6.1(3) places a chain-of-notice obligation on recipients: an occupier or contractor who receives the notice must forward it by registered mail or personal service to any other occupier of the premises and to any other independent contractor employed to remove snow or ice at that time. This means a claimant does not need to identify every occupier or every contractor independently, provided notice reaches at least one of them within 60 days.

Exceptions. Two situations excuse non-compliance:

1. Death. If the injured person dies as a result of the injuries, failure to give notice is not a bar to the claim (s. 6.1(5)).
2. Reasonable excuse. A court may allow an action to proceed despite want or insufficiency of notice if the claimant has a reasonable excuse for the non-compliance and the defendant is not prejudiced in its defence (s. 6.1(6)). Courts apply this exception narrowly; a simple failure to consult a lawyer in time has generally not been treated as a reasonable excuse.

The 60-day window is strict and unforgiving in the absence of one of these exceptions. If you slipped on ice at a shopping centre car park on 1 December, your written notice must be served no later than 30 January. Acting promptly and preserving documentation of the premises, conditions, and your injuries is critical.

No other Canadian province has enacted an equivalent pre-suit written notice requirement for snow and ice claims.

Claims Against a Municipality: The 10-Day Notice and Gross Negligence Standard

Falls on public sidewalks, municipal parks, city-operated arenas, or other municipally maintained property are governed by two overlapping regimes that are even more demanding than the OLA alone.

10-day written notice. Section 44(10) of the Municipal Act, 2001 (SO 2001, c 25) requires that any person who intends to bring an action against a municipality for injury arising from failure to maintain a highway or bridge must give the municipality written notice within 10 days of the incident. The notice must state the date, time, and location of the occurrence and must be served on the clerk of the municipality.

Ten days is an extremely short window. Many injury victims are hospitalised or focused on recovery in the immediate aftermath of a fall and are unaware of this requirement. Section 44(12) permits a judge to excuse non-compliance if the claimant establishes a reasonable excuse for the failure and the municipality has not been prejudiced in its defence, but this exception is applied cautiously and is not guaranteed.

Gross negligence standard for snow and ice. For falls caused by snow or ice on a municipal sidewalk, s. 44 of the Municipal Act imposes a higher threshold: the municipality is not liable unless it was grossly negligent in its maintenance. Ordinary negligence, even if proven, is not enough to establish a municipality's liability for icy sidewalks. Gross negligence requires a very marked departure from the standard of care that a reasonable person would observe.

Dual-notice risk. A fall on a snow-covered public sidewalk in Ontario triggers both regimes simultaneously. The 10-day municipal notice under s. 44(10) and the 60-day OLA snow-and-ice notice under s. 6.1 should both be served. Complying with one does not discharge the other. The 10-day deadline is the more dangerous to miss.

How Long You Have to Sue: The Two-Year Limitation Period

Ontario's Limitations Act, 2002 (SO 2002, c 24 Sch B) sets the standard limitation period for slip-and-fall claims. Section 4 provides that no proceeding shall be commenced after the second anniversary of the day on which the claim was "discovered."

Discovery under s. 5 occurs on the earliest date on which the claimant knew, or ought reasonably to have known, all of the following:

• that the injury, loss, or damage occurred;
• that the injury was caused by or contributed to by an act or omission;
• that the act or omission was that of the defendant; and
• that a proceeding would be an appropriate means to seek to remedy it.

In a straightforward slip-and-fall, discovery typically coincides with the date of the fall itself. In more complicated cases, such as where a head injury causes delayed realisation of cognitive symptoms, discovery may be later. The 15-year ultimate limitation period in s. 15 caps all claims regardless of discovery.

The two-year limitation period can mislead injured people into believing they have time to act. The 10-day and 60-day notice requirements described above are procedural bars that operate independently of and far in advance of the limitation period. Missing either notice deadline can end a claim before the two-year clock has barely started.

Contributory Negligence and Damages

Defendants in Ontario slip-and-fall cases frequently raise contributory negligence: the argument that the claimant's own conduct contributed to the fall. Common arguments include that the claimant was wearing footwear unsuited to winter conditions, was distracted by a mobile phone, ignored a clearly visible warning sign, or failed to use a handrail.

Ontario abolished the old common-law rule that any contributory negligence bars recovery entirely. The Negligence Act, RSO 1990, c N.1, replaces that rule with proportionate apportionment: where two or more persons are at fault, liability is divided among them in proportion to their degree of fault. A claimant found 30 per cent at fault recovers 70 per cent of their damages.

Categories of damages available in a successful claim include:

• General (non-pecuniary) damages: pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, loss of amenities. These are subject to the informal Supreme Court of Canada cap established in Andrews v. Grand & Toy Alberta Ltd, 1978 CanLII 1 (SCC), indexed to approximately CAD $430,000 to $450,000 in 2025 dollars.
• Special (pecuniary) damages: actual medical expenses, rehabilitation costs, lost wages, and future care costs. These are uncapped and assessed on the evidence.
• Aggravated and punitive damages: rarely awarded in slip-and-fall cases, and only where the defendant's conduct is particularly high-handed or deliberate.

Documenting your losses from the outset, including medical records, receipts, employment records, and photos of the scene and your injuries, strengthens a damages claim considerably.

How to Make a Slip-and-Fall Claim in Ontario

Knowing what to do immediately after a fall can preserve your right to compensation:

At the scene. Report the fall to the occupier or their manager and ask for an incident report. Photograph the hazard, your footwear, and any warning signs (or their absence). Note the exact time and date and collect the names of witnesses.

Seek medical attention promptly. A same-day medical record creates a contemporaneous account of your injuries and links them to the fall. Delaying treatment gives defendants grounds to argue the injuries were not caused by the fall.

Serve notice immediately. If the fall involved snow or ice, start the clock on the 60-day OLA notice immediately. If the premises are municipal, the 10-day notice begins running from the moment of the fall. These deadlines cannot be extended by the claimant's own inaction. Consult a lawyer within days of the incident, not weeks.

Preserve evidence. Photographs of snow or ice conditions degrade quickly once weather changes. Security footage may be overwritten within days. Request preservation of any relevant footage in writing as soon as possible.

Document your losses. Keep every receipt for medical care, prescription drugs, physiotherapy, and adapted equipment. Track every day of work missed. These records form the foundation of your special damages claim.

Slip-and-fall litigation in Ontario is procedurally demanding. The interplay of the 60-day OLA snow-and-ice notice, the 10-day municipal notice, and the two-year limitation period means that several independent deadlines can each destroy a claim. Acting quickly after an injury, and obtaining legal advice promptly, is essential.

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