Two thirds of UK drivers (65.1%) – or around 21.4 million motorists – have forgotten where they parked their car, according to a new study by Nissan.

According to the survey of 2,000 motorists, one in three (33.75%) said they do so at least once a month and a further 5% admitted to losing their mode of transport on a weekly basis.

As the UK heads towards ‘Super Saturday’ – the busiest shopping day before Christmas – thousands of motorists could be stranded in the cold for up to half an hour hunting down their lost vehicle, in car parks crammed with last-minute gift-buyers.

The overall average time to locate a lost car is 10 minutes, although 5% of respondents admitted to searching for more than half an hour.

For those who frequently misplace their vehicle (once a month or more), the collective time spent each year hunting down parked cars is over 35 million hours – around one hour per year for every UK driver.*

Whilst women are more likely to forget where they parked (72% vs. 58% of male respondents), they take less time to find their vehicles – 8.8 minutes on average vs. 11.9 minutes for men.

Of the places drivers are most likely to misplace their vehicles, multi-storey car parks came out number one, closely followed by shopping centres, supermarkets and airports.

Places most likely to lose a car
1. Multi-storeys
2. Shopping centres
3. Supermarkets
4. Airports
5. Town/City Street

Despite in-car and smartphone technology enabling motorists to log precisely where they park and navigate back to their vehicle, only 9% of respondents said they had used a smartphone to track the location of their parked car.

However, the 25-34 age range proved the most technically capable in this area, with 16% saying they have used a smartphone to find their car – almost double the overall average.

Arun Prasad, passenger car category manager, Nissan Motor (GB) Ltd. commented: “In-car connectivity and smartphone apps let drivers use simple and accessible technology to mitigate against some of the everyday pitfalls of motoring – such as forgetting where you parked your car.”

Arun added: “Through Nissan Intelligent Mobility – our vision for the future of motoring – we’re changing the way we interact with our vehicles to benefit customer lives. Helping drivers easily locate their car is just one of the many benefits under our Intelligent Integration strategy.”

The latest version of the Nissan Qashqai, the UK’s best-selling crossover, brings a new level of integration between the driver, smartphone and vehicle. Its Door to Door Navigation application includes a ‘Find My Car’ function that allows the driver to locate and be guided to their parked connected car. The smartphone has to be paired one time with the navigation system via Bluetooth® so when a driver leaves the vehicle and the ignition is turned off, the location is logged and the parked position can be seen on a map overlay in the Door to Door Navigation application.
When the user wants to return to their car, they simply search for a destination on the app. It will guide them to their car, first with a walking route and then – once in the car – driving directions will appear via the in-car navigation. The walking route is available if the user is within 3.1 miles/5 km of the car.

* Based on the responses of 2,000 UK motorists in November 2018 in a survey carried out by www.onepoll.com. There are 32.9 million licence holders in the UK (https://bit.ly/2P8rEtk).