Your stall is empty. The first call is to the desk that controls that exact spot. If Memphis Police, the Shelby County Sheriff, or Housing and Community Development ordered the tow, call the city Vehicle Storage Lot at 465 Klinke Avenue, (901) 636-8200. If you parked on an apartment, store, or HOA lot, call the property and the number on the sign. Quick Tow Memphis matches you with local operators. We do not hold your car, and we do not run a yard.
Start with where the car was parked
Stand in the empty space and name it before you dial. A meter on Union in Midtown, a Poplar shopping pad in East Memphis, a Cordova apartment row, and a Bartlett curb do not feed the same desk. Whitehaven and Germantown sit in the same metro. The roads, the housing, and the agency still differ.
Look at the stall. A hydrant, a driveway throat, a fire lane, or a “customer parking only” board usually means a parking tow, not a theft. On a paid commercial lot, and on lots that use automatic license-plate readers, Tennessee requires red lettering no less than 6 inches high on a white background. That notice goes at each designated exit for the late fee, and at each designated entrance for the reader notice. Ordinary trespass lots have no statewide sign-size rule. The control there is express written authorization on the operator.
Write down every name and phone on the board. Ask the nearest shop which wrecker the property uses. A Hickory Hill or Berclair apartment tow is usually a private-property tow the office ordered. A downtown street tow is more often a police tow. On Lamar Avenue, which carries US-78 and SR-4, a blocking vehicle is more likely to be moved as a hazard. TDOT’s Memphis Congestion Study calls Lamar the top congested state road in the region and a clogged corridor for trucking.
If you left the car on I-40 across the Hernando de Soto Bridge, on I-55 across the Memphis & Arkansas Bridge, on the I-240 loop, or on SR-385 / Bill Morris Parkway, a unit may have ordered it moved. TDOT HELP patrols those listed routes Monday through Sunday, 6:00 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. HELP changes flats, delivers fuel, gives minor mechanical help, and clears blocking vehicles. HELP does not tow to a shop, a home, or a lot.
Do not call 911 unless someone is hurt or the scene is still dangerous. Tennessee does not authorize a tow solely because the tags are expired. The car is towable when it is a hazard, blocking access, illegally parked, or it meets the abandoned-vehicle rules. Repossession is a separate track. Confirm the controlling desk before you treat the car as stolen.
Call the agency or property that controls that spot
On private land, the property is the first desk. Call the office, the after-hours number on the gate, or the wrecker printed on the board. Ask if they authorized a tow, which company took it, and where it is stored. Ask for year, make, plate, and the reason they wrote down. Tennessee still requires express written authorization before a non-consent tow or storage, from a law-enforcement officer, the vehicle’s owner, or the property owner or their agent.
If you catch the truck before it leaves the original parking location, the owner or operator can pay a release fee and the car must be released on the spot. A release fee over $100 is prohibited on that kind of non-consent work. Get the paperwork. Save the dispute for after the car is free.
When the car came off a Memphis street, or from an MPD, sheriff, or HCD scene, skip the private wrecker hunt. There is one city lot. Those three agencies all process through the Memphis Police Department Vehicle Storage Lot. There is no separate Shelby County impound lot. Memphis has no live online tow lookup. The phone line is the single point of contact: (901) 636-8200. The lot sits at 465 Klinke Avenue, Memphis, TN 38127, and it is open seven days, 24 hours.
Ask that line whether the car is there, whether a criminal-investigation hold is on it, and what they need at the window. A hold has to be cleared before pickup. If the city lot does not have it, you are back to the property and a private yard.
City wrecker rules honor the owner’s choice of towing company, with three exceptions MPD decides: the company isn’t permitted, can’t respond in reasonable time, or the vehicle is an immediate traffic hazard. That choice matters only while the car is still on the street. Once it is on a hook and gone, you are locating it, not picking the truck.
This page is the first desk. For the hunt after that call, use the guide to finding a towed car in Memphis.
Separate a city lot from a private yard
The city lot is police storage. A private yard is a garagekeeper’s lot. Fees, hours, and papers are not the same, and mixing them wastes a trip.
At the city lot, the city’s fees are an impound fee of $135.00 and storage of $30.00 per day, excluding winching or other additional charges. Cash and credit are accepted. Those are the city’s numbers, not ours. Under city wrecker rules, storage rates begin 24 hours after impound. Wrecker companies operating inside city limits must be approved by the Memphis Transportation Commission.
A private yard bills its own hookup, mileage, and storage. Tennessee does not set a single statewide dollar cap on the tow itself. A garagekeeper may not charge more than the maximum fee approved by the Tennessee Highway Patrol district for the same service. Two hard statewide limits apply when the owner did not give express written authorization: a release fee of more than $100 is prohibited, and no gate, access, or release fee during normal business hours on any day daily storage is also charged. Storage may not be charged past 21 days without the owner’s or lienholder’s consent, unless the owner was told the vehicle is ready and refused to collect it. After notice, the reclaim window is 20 days from the notice date.
If an operator overcharges under city wrecker rules, the remedy is to reimburse all monies paid, or release the vehicle free. City complaints go to the Permits Administrator / Wrecker Coordinator at (901) 636-6735 or permits@memphistn.gov. For what you can demand on the bill, read your rights when towed in Memphis.
At a Memphis impound, personal property and cargo not physically attached to the vehicle must be released to the owner or designee on request, unless MPD orders otherwise. No retrieval fee is published for that request. What happens at the curb before the truck leaves is unconfirmed in the law we can cite, so treat it as a request, not a published right.
What changes across the Mississippi line
A tow that starts in Southaven, Horn Lake, or Olive Branch is a Mississippi tow. A tow that starts in West Memphis or Marion is an Arkansas tow. Tennessee’s clocks and the Klinke Avenue lot do not follow the car across the state line.
DeSoto County is a short hop from Hickory Hill and Whitehaven. People park at Southaven shops and live in Memphis, or the reverse. For a Southaven police matter, the published non-emergency line is (662) 393-8652, at 8691 Northwest Drive. Southaven publishes no impound-lot page and no fee schedule we can confirm. Call that desk and ask where the car went. Do not drive to 465 Klinke Avenue expecting a Mississippi tow to be waiting there.
West Memphis and Marion follow Arkansas process. We have no verified West Memphis lot name, address, or fee to print. Call the agency or property that controls that Arkansas spot and ask them to locate it.
Do not quote Tennessee notice clocks, city impound fees, or Memphis wrecker rules to a Southaven or West Memphis yard. The MOTION Act, 2025 Public Chapter 457, is Tennessee law. It does not govern a DeSoto County or Crittenden County pickup.
If you later need the car moved from a Mississippi or Arkansas yard into Memphis, that is a separate, consented haul. Ask for the full total with mileage included before you agree, and ask what would change it.
What to have ready before you call
Have the plate, the VIN if you have it, the year, make, color, and the exact place you parked. “Near Poplar” is not a place. “The pad off Germantown Parkway” or “the lot behind the Summer Avenue store” is a place. Name the city: Memphis, Bartlett, Cordova, Germantown, Southaven.
For the city lot, owner pickup needs proof of ownership (registration, title, or lease), the plate or VIN, and a valid photo ID. A licensed driver must drive it off, or a tow is arranged for an added fee. A non-owner needs a notarized statement from the owner naming the person, a legible copy of the owner’s photo ID, the plate or VIN, and the make and year. A rental needs the rental agreement plus matching ID. The window list is in what to bring for a Memphis impound release.
Tennessee does not require towing coverage on a liability policy. Whether insurance pays depends on your own roadside endorsement, not on a state mandate. The city lot’s published release list does not name proof of insurance. Bring it if you have it. Do not treat it as a confirmed city-lot requirement.
Ask every desk three things before you drive: the total with storage through today, what would change that number overnight, and whether a hold is on the car. Distance, vehicle size, time of day, truck type, and hookup difficulty all move a private bill. Get the total in writing before you agree to a second tow off the yard.
If that second tow is the call to us, the line takes calls 24/7 at (901) 557-8700. Your call routes to the operator covering your zone. Calls are recorded and transcribed, and a recording notice plays first. We still will not have the car. We can match you with an operator once you know it is a private tow, a release from the city lot, or a consented haul.
When to call us
Call us when the car is already located and you need an operator to take it off a lot, home, or shop, or when a private-property tow is still in progress and you want your own company on the ticket. Call us at (901) 557-8700.