A Stirling supermarket has denied claims from a Fallin businesswoman that her work van was filled with contaminated fuel earlier this year.
Naomi Lennox, 28, purchased the Vauxhall Vivaro for her work as a dog walker in March 2023 and had taken fuel religiously from the garage at the Sainsbury’s store at nearby Drip Road.
But following a fuel stop in April, the van broke down and suffered a full fuel system failure – with a subsequent inspection by a mechanic blaming the condition of the fuel present within the vehicle.
The damage caused to the van forced Naomi to have to find a new vehicle to continue with her work, but she has called for responsibility from the supermarket over the issue – despite a later inspection dipping the fuel and finding it clear.
Naomi said: “I had filled up the van religiously every week to 10 days but it broke down in April after I had filled it up and so took it to the garage.
“Initially, I thought it was just one injector which was dumping the fuel straight away, but we found out it had been all four and the fuel had destroyed anything it had touched.
“It affected the lining, the pipes, the fuel tank and it looked like it was really low quality fuel.
“I hired a van to keep me going during the work, but it ended up being in for more than a month and I was eventually told to get shot of it because the whole fuel system and engine would have needed replaced.
“Trading Standards went to inspect and dipped the fuel but it was clean at that point, but I feel as if this can’t be the only time this has happened to someone, so I’m just getting the word there for any other people affected.”
Naomi claims the impact of the damage has cost her thousands of pounds on the sale of the van, alongside the hiring of the replacement vehicle in order to keep her business on the road.
She also says that complaints made to Sainsbury’s fell on deaf ears, with the supermarket insisting it had not received any other complaints of people with similar issues.
In a response to an enquiry from the Observer, a Sainsbury’s spokeswoman said a “thorough investigation” had been carried out at the garage which found “no evidence of fuel contamination”.
The spokeswoman added that Ms Lennox was “reassured” of the investigations into her issue at the time of the complaint – as well as being informed of measures to monitor fuel contamination, including “continuous monitoring and alerts on site”.