Following the controversy over police vehicles parking at Northmead Square, in disabled bays, I would like to register my unhappiness with parking for senior citizens at Lakeside Mall.
On applying for their priority parking sticker for my parents, aged in their late 70s and 80s, I was told stickers would be issued in January only.
I was assured that, in the meantime, the car guard would open a bay for them.
Well, this has just been tested!
The guard was not allowed to open any type of special bay and his manager, Mike, also refused, despite the fact that three disabled bays were open in the row where I was.
While I was there, a police van dropped a lady in uniform, who sauntered into a bank, while the driver parked his van in a disabled bay!
I called centre management, who, while very polite, did absolutely nothing to assist.
Surely she could have radioed Mike to allow me to park, especially with my father, who walks with a stick and with difficulty.
My feeling is that they do not care and this will lead me to take my parents to another centre in future.
The only reason we stayed today is because my mother had an appointment with an optometrist in this mall – last time!
Just an attempt to assist would have kept me shopping at Lakeside, where I have spent thousands of rand.
The marketing lady I spoke to did not even ask for my number!
Editor’s Note, Carolynn Weedon, Lakeside Mall marketing manager, said: “Thank you for bringing this matter to our attention.
“We, at Lakeside Mall, pride ourselves on our customer service and, as such, the client is correct in that we should have taken the time to address the issue with the client real time.
“On investigation with marketing, it seems that the customer called our office and spoke to our marketing assistant, but did not give her details or allow Kiki the opportunity to converse with her in an attempt to assist.
“I would like to expand a little further on the complaint, in that there are two separate parking facilities offered at Lakeside Mall to our clients.
“Firstly, disabled parking bays are for the exclusive use of those who are legally entitled to occupy such a bay.
“In order to qualify to make use of our disabled parking facilities, we have had to clamp down very hard and adopt a zero tolerance policy on this, simply because these bays get abused by able-bodied individuals daily, leaving the entitled clients unable to make use of these bays.
“To this end, we have taken the view that only legally issued parking disc holders will be permitted to park in these bays.
“To this end we work closely with the GPAPD to ensure that the clients who are in need of such a disc are assisted in obtaining same.
“Priority parking is a service offered by the mall itself, and its aim is to assist pensioners, moms with small babies and toddlers and other clients who may have short term disabilities that do not qualify them for a disabled disk to have convenient parking close to the entrance of the mall.
“These parking bays must be applied for and approved by centre management to again ensure that they are not abused.
“We accept only a limited number of priority parking applications per year and a waiting list is kept for additional applications, should same become available during the course of the year.
“I am unsure who would have confirmed to the client that the bays would be available to her parents without the disk, as this is completely against procedure.
“The purpose of having the disc is to ensure that only disk holders make use of this parking service and as such anyone without a disk would not be permitted to park there.
“As to the issue of the police van dropping off a uniformed lady at the bank; this is strictly forbidden and should not have been allowed.
“Unfortunately, Mike is not in a position to make decisions on who is entitled to use either disabled or priority parking bays, as he is merely a manager for our contracted customer and trolley assistant company and, as such, not a member of the Lakeside Mall management team.
We are keen to assist the customer in obtaining a disk for her parents, and request that she contact our marketing department and make arrangements for this disk to be delivered or collected.
