I would like to bring a situation under your attention that happened to me and my partner today (5 February 2026) at Engen Fairlands.
My partner hit a pothole on his way home. He drove to the nearest garage to leave his car there so we can fix the problem the next morning, because he was called out for an emergency at the hospital. This was more or less 20:48
He told one of the attendants that we have a flat tyre and we would collect the car the next day. He parked the car on the "excess" side of the garage not to interfere with the cars that will be visiting the garage.
The next morning we waited for the tyre garage to open at 8. He took of the tyre and took it to the tyre shop. We do have one of the new vehicles that don't have an extra tyre. Struggling to get a tyre they gave us a loan tyre to put on our car. So at this point our car is standing at the garage without a wheel.
After my partner operated, we returned to the garage (round about 11:30) to put on the loan tyre. What a delight to arrive and have our car wheel clamped. I was instructed by die security to please go to the manager.
What a lovely experience I had there. The manager/owner told me we should have asked them if we can park our car there, since it is private property. I explained the whole situation and all she did was roll her eyes at me. According to her we should have asked for permission, not understanding we had an emergency, and we also told the petrol attendant. According to her, we should have followed a process to tell them we are leaving the car there, and ask for permission. I must be ignorant because I wasn't aware of that. I feel the managers/owners must have been there when he took off the tyre the next morning, couldn't they just come out and tell us this, did they have to clamp it?
At his point I really wanted to cry because it was all a little bit overwhelming for me. I got my partner to come and talk to them. Again he explained the situation to them, and again we were told we handled our crisis wrong. If she just took the effort to watch the cameras and see he ask an attendant to park there.
She reiterated to me that there is a 15 minute parking time. Which I completely understand. So I would just like to know the people that eat at the Wimpy are they in and out in 15 minutes? I would just like to point out again that we parked on the far side of the garage not to interfere with customers that might be using the garage, nor did we park it in front of a petrol pump that will affect the money side of things.
I think the treatment we received was really unfair and dismissive. The staff at the garage know us so well, we get our morning coffee there at least 4 times a week, our late dinners at the woolworths. We fill up our cars every second week, because we do have hooligan cars that seep through diesel. The staff always laughs when I arrive in the morning and ask, please wake me up with a cappuccino, so I can go and teach children. I will never support this garage again.
I am including the pictures of where our vehicle was parked, not to affect their business. We had to pay R350 to have our own vehicle back. I am also including the contact number for the tyre place, who will confirm we have a loan tyre on our car.
I really feel the way we were treated in a crisis situation was most definitely not fair.
Recommendation: Don't use their parking in a Crisis situation, rather fuck up your tyre and drive to another garage