Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf Burn Injury Lawsuits: Hot Tea Spills, Your Rights, and How to Sue (Updated November 2026)

By Michael Shemtoub, trial attorney, Beverly Law. Updated November 2026.

Beverly Law is not affiliated with The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf.

What to do after a Coffee Bean burn

1. Cool the burn. For a minor burn with unbroken skin, MedlinePlus says to run cool water, not ice water, over it for at least 5 to 30 minutes, and not to remove clothing stuck to the skin. Call 911 if the burn is about the size of your palm or larger (MedlinePlus).
2. Get burn center care for a deep burn. The ABA recommends burn center consultation for any full-thickness burn, partial-thickness burns of 10% or more of body surface, and deep burns of the face, hands, feet, genitals, perineum or over any joint (ABA referral guidelines). A deep burn to the genitals or perineum from tea spilled into the lap is on that list.
3. Keep the cup, lid and sleeve, and the tea bag if it is still in the cup. Let it cool, then bag it.
4. Keep your receipt or app order, which shows the store and the time, and write down the names of the staff on shift and any witnesses.
5. Photograph the burn the same day and every day for two weeks, and the clothing.
6. Ask the cafe operator in writing, within days, to keep the video of the counter and pickup shelf for the time of your visit. Use our evidence preservation letter and the after-a-burn checklist.

A Los Angeles brand with mixed ownership of its cafes

Herbert Hyman and his wife, Mona, founded The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf in 1963 and opened their first store in the Brentwood area of Los Angeles, according to the Associated Press (AP via KSL). The company says Hyman began adding teas to the menu in 1974, when it had 10 cafes in Southern California. It now describes a global headquarters in Singapore that opened in 2023 (Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf).

Jollibee Foods Corporation of the Philippines completed its $350 million purchase of the brand on September 24, 2019 (Philippine Star). At the time of the deal, QSR Magazine reported that 336 of the chain’s 1,189 locations the year before were corporate-run (QSR Magazine).

That mix matters after a burn. Your cafe may be run by the company or by a franchisee or licensee. The operator is the first defendant, because its crew filled and handed over the drink. Whether the brand owner also answers depends on control. Under the California Supreme Court’s test, set in a franchise harassment case, the franchisor can be held responsible for a franchisee’s staff only if it kept or took on general control over how that staff is hired, supervised and disciplined and how they behave day to day on the job (Patterson v. Domino’s Pizza, 2014). At a company-run cafe, that question does not arise.

Why hot tea causes deep burns

Tea gets its own section here because of how hot its water is. Tea is typically brewed at about 200°F, close to boiling, and the recommended pour temperature for tea water is higher than for coffee.

A 2019 review of hot beverage temperatures in the Journal of Food Science lays out the stages, first as they typically run and then as the authors recommend (Abraham and Diller, 2019):

The authors also report that a lid roughly doubles the time a drink takes to cool. A lidded tea handed over minutes after pouring can still be well above the temperatures in the American Burn Association’s scald table, where adult skin suffers a third-degree burn in about 1 second at 155°F and 15 seconds at 133°F (ABA scald guide).

The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf has not published a serving temperature in any source we reviewed, and we make no claim about how hot any particular drink was. That is a question for the evidence in each case.

How tea and coffee spills happen at a cafe counter

Removing the tea bag. A customer pulls the lid off a full cup to take out the tea bag. A cup filled to the rim spills with any tilt.

Sleeves and cup walls. A cup of near-boiling water needs insulation. A missing sleeve can make the cup too hot to hold, and the customer’s reflex to let go is what spills it.

Lids that seat on one side. A lid pressed down on one edge only can release when the cup is squeezed at the handoff.

Pickup counters. Drinks left on a shelf for pickup are lifted one-handed, often with a phone in the other hand. The store must have done something wrong before the pickup, such as an unseated lid or an overfilled cup, for that kind of spill to support a claim.

Burns to children. A hot tea set down on a low table or a stroller tray is within a child’s reach. The ABA notes that its scald table is based on adult skin.

What a claim looks like in California

The base rule is ordinary care: everyone is responsible for injury caused by a lack of ordinary care in managing their property or person (Civ. Code § 1714). For a cafe, that means filling, lidding and handing over a near-boiling drink in a way that does not burn the customer. If the cup or lid itself was defective, its maker is strictly liable in California (Greenman v. Yuba Power Products), which is why the lid should be kept.

Some cafes sit inside airports, hospitals or other public buildings. If a public entity is responsible for the condition that caused the burn, California requires a written government claim within six months (Gov. Code § 911.2). Against a private cafe operator, the deadline is two years (CCP § 335.1).

Burn care in Los Angeles

The American Burn Association lists two ABA-verified burn centers in Los Angeles County: Los Angeles General Medical Center’s Regional Burn Center and Torrance Memorial Burn Center, both for adults and children. The UCLA Health Regional Burn Center at UCLA West Valley Medical Center in West Hills, formerly the Grossman Burn Center, is listed by the ABA as another burn center (ABA directory; UCLA Health).

See our page for a Los Angeles burn injury lawyer for more local detail.

Deadlines in California, Texas and Washington

Texas cases are handled by the firm’s Texas-licensed attorneys, Joyce Ondich and John Efstathiou.

Related pages

Burn injury lawyer · Scald burns · Drive-thru burns · Peet’s burns · Starbucks burns · Los Angeles burn injury lawyer · Hot beverage temperatures

Talk to a burn injury lawyer

If a hot tea or coffee from a Coffee Bean or another Los Angeles cafe burned you or your child, call Beverly Law at (310) 552-6959 for a free, confidential review in English or Spanish. Our office is at 4929 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 960, Los Angeles. You owe no fees or costs unless we win.

Common questions

Related pages

Burn Injury Lawyer

Important: This page is general information, not legal or medical advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Every case is different; talk to a lawyer about yours. Texas cases are handled by the firm’s Texas-licensed attorneys, Joyce Ondich and John Efstathiou. Last reviewed: November 6, 2026.