The first step that big corporations take is to replace people with machines. Unfortunately, in trying to save the cost of people, they don’t seem to ever spend any money fixing the parking machines. On a recent visit to Sandton I walked first to one parking machine to pay, and when that did not work, I walked to another machine, which also did not work. It was only when I got to the third machine that I was actually able to pay for the parking. Of course, Nelson Mandela Square and Sandton City don’t have much competition, which is why they can get away with leaving the same parking machines in a state of disrepair, and people will still return there.

I guess that one of the problems of living in a smaller country is that there is not that much competition, and in many respects we are forced to put up with unacceptable service.