Surviving a cardiac arrest in a supermarket car park is already the sort of experience that puts an ordinary day into extraordinary perspective.

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Receiving a parking ticket because your car remained there while hospital staff battled to save your life… that’s a little harder to comprehend.

However, that was the remarkable situation faced by a 54-year-old woman in Auckland, New Zealand, after she collapsed in the car park of New World supermarket in Orewa on Auckland’s Hibiscus Coast on July 26.

Her father, Keith Wilkinson, said supermarket staff quickly stepped in to provide assistance and privacy screens.

But when his daughter could not be found to have a pulse, it was a stranger at the scene who took control and began performing chest compressions. That intervention proved crucial.

“The stranger just melted away once my daughter had regained a pulse and St John ambulance arrived on the scene, before anyone could thank her,” Wilkinson told NZ publication Stuff.

He described the stranger’s actions as “truly remarkable”.

The seriousness of what had happened became even clearer when paramedics spoke to the woman’s family.

According to Wilkinson, they were told that his daughter’s heart had stopped and “momentarily, she was technically dead”.

She was eventually transported by ambulance to North Shore Hospital.

Understandably, moving her car was hardly the priority while a life-threatening medical emergency was unfolding.

Customers were permitted to park in the supermarket car park for 90 minutes, but the woman’s vehicle remained there for around five-and-a-half hours as she received emergency and life-saving medical attention.

Then, several days after she had been brought back to life, another surprise arrived.

She had been issued an $80 breach notice by Smart Compliance Management.

Her family subsequently explained the extraordinary circumstances behind the car remaining in the car park beyond the permitted time.

But rather than immediately cancelling the notice, the company initially reduced the amount she was required to pay from $80 to $30.

In an email, the company explained its reasoning.

“Smart Compliance Management has been contracted to provide fair and equal opportunity for parking at this car park. This is why a maximum stay time limit applies,“ the email read. “Customers are entitled to 90 minutes of parking. Your vehicle was parked for 341 minutes.

“Having considered your appeal in detail we have decided to uphold the Breach Notice as we believe that it was correctly issued in accordance with the terms and conditions advertised within the area concerned.

“Due to the circumstances resulting in this Breach Notice, we are able to reduce this to a $30** **administration fee.”

For the woman’s family, that response only added frustration to an already distressing situation.

Wilkinson said they found the request “offensive”, particularly as they had been loyal customers of the supermarket for years.

His daughter ultimately paid the $30 because the issue was causing her stress.

However, the story did not end there.

Staff at New World Orewa stepped in and paid $30 into the woman’s account, a resolution Wilkinson described as “fair”.

Steve McClean, the owner-operator of New World Orewa, said the supermarket also contacted Smart Compliance after learning what had happened and asked for the breach notice to be withdrawn, including a refund of the fee that had already been paid.

“This was a deeply distressing situation for the customer and their family, and I’m sorry this caused them additional stress and inconvenience,” McClean said.

Smart Compliance also subsequently apologised for how the case had initially been handled.

A spokesperson said the company apologises for the “additional stress caused to this individual following their medical emergency” and acknowledged that its original response did not “appropriately take into account the circumstances of the case”.

The company said changes had since been made to help its staff deal with unusual cases such as this one.

“We have since reinforced our processes and provided further guidance to our team to support consistent decision-making in exceptional circumstances,” the spokesperson added.

New World Orewa uses a third-party provider to manage its customer parking, with the intention of making sure spaces remain available to shoppers when required.

But McClean made clear that enforcing parking restrictions should still involve judgement when exceptional circumstances arise.

“It’s important that parking rules are applied fairly and with common sense,” he said. “Given the circumstances, I completely understand why the customer and their family were upset, and I’m pleased the right thing has now happened.”

Featured image credit: Google Maps (screenshot)