Sainsbury's has paid out almost £4,000 in compensation to a woman who complained she was attacked by a member of staff in a busy supermarket aisle.

Louisa Cotterill, 32, was shopping in the store in Witan Way, Witney, in July last year when the incident happened.

Speaking to the Oxford Mail yesterday after learning of her compensation payout, Miss Cotterill, of Dawls Close, Ascott-under-Wychwood, west Oxfordshire, said she was still suffering the effects of what had happened.

She said: “The last place you expect to get attacked is while shopping in the supermarket – and certainly not by a member of staff.”

“It was just such a surreal experience.”

J Sainsbury Plc accepted liability in a letter to Miss Cotterill’s solicitor in November last year and on Thursday, she received a settlement of £3,816.

The mother-of-three, who was shopping with her then one-year-old son Laurence, eight-year-old son Daniel and her partner on a busy Saturday afternoon, said the middle-aged female supermarket worker “just flipped”.

She said: “I was in the refrigerator aisle and the woman was stocking the shelves.

“I brushed against her, not hard at all, and as soon as I did it I turned to her and said ‘sorry’.

“The next thing I knew, she had launched herself at me and shoved me into the chiller.”

As a result of this, she was left with damage to her back, shoulder and neck that required a course of physiotherapy and treatment from a chiropractor.

She still has to sleep with pillows supporting her back.

Miss Cotterill said: “I’m still in pain now – they have told me to expect it to take at least a year before things are back to normal.”

Last night, Sainsbury’s declined to say whether the female worker was still employed by the supermarket giant.

Miss Cotterill’s partner Charlie Preston, 37, fetched the store manager immediately after the incident.

He said: “To be fair, he handled the situation very well and took us into his office to take a statement from us and another shopper.

“I had to take time off work when it happened as my partner was in quite a bit of pain and my son Daniel was quite traumatised as he saw it all happen.”

Miss Cotterill said that although the store manager had apologised at the time of the incident, no formal apology had been made by the company.

She said: “It’s like them saying ‘here’s your money, now take it and leave us alone’. It would be nice for someone to say sorry for what happened.”

A Sainsbury’s spokesman said: “Customer safety is our number one priority and incidents such as this are extremely rare.”