Miss this classification after a fall, animal encounter, or other property injury, and a valid claim can be undervalued or rejected because the owner's legal duty may be judged by the wrong standard. An invitee is a person who enters land or a building with the owner's or occupier's permission for a purpose connected to the owner's interests, usually business or a use the property is held open to the public for. A grocery customer, hotel guest, delivery driver in an open service area, or patient entering a clinic is usually an invitee.

That status matters because an owner generally owes an invitee the highest duty recognized in basic premises liability analysis: reasonable care to inspect for hazards, correct dangerous conditions, and warn about risks the invitee is unlikely to discover on their own. The issue is often whether the danger was known, should have been found through reasonable inspection, or was open and obvious.

In an injury claim, invitee status affects whether there was a duty of care, whether the owner had notice of the hazard, and whether a failure to clean, repair, light, fence, or warn counts as negligence. In Wyoming, fault is then reduced under the modified comparative fault rule, Wyo. Stat. § 1-1-109 (2024). If the injured person is 50% or more at fault, recovery is barred; below 50%, damages are reduced by that percentage.