Now that I’ve reached my 40s, I’ve started to notice a number of entirely unwelcome lifestyle changes. An involuntary ‘ooh’ when I sit in a comfy chair. A feeling of relief when a friend cancels a night on the town. A fear that I might need bifocals. A refusal to go down the pub unless I can get a seat.
Perhaps most worrying is my memory. I’ve always been scatty and I spend a fortune on Post-it notes. But last week I went to the post box and returned home with the letter still in my hand. It’s not an encouraging sign.
On the up side, I’ve still some way to go before I turn in to my dad. Frequently forgetful, he surpassed himself the time we left a football match early to beat the traffic. After spending a good 20 minutes searching in vain for the car (by which time the game had ended and people were streaming through the gates), he realised he was looking for a blue Vauxhall Astra he’d owned ten years previously. Admittedly the Bolton Wanderers’ car park is difficult to navigate – but come on!
Now it turns out that my dad is not alone. New research from Direct Line Car Insurance reveals that more than 14 million Britons suffer from car amnesia, admitting they forgot where they parked their vehicle in the last 12 months. That’s almost one in three drivers.
But aside from a red face, does is really matter that much? Well, it can do. One in ten motorists have had to pay for additional parking after failing to locate their vehicle, spending a collective £126 million in extra charges (the average unwanted cost is more than £22). Some have incurred parking tickets and others have encountered more serious consequences with six per cent of forgetful drivers having their vehicle towed or clamped after failing to find it.
And it comes as no surprise to me that male drivers spend longer on average looking for their lost vehicles than women. It’s a bit like reading maps: have you ever met a man who admits to being lost? No, me neither.
On average, we spend 25 minutes looking for our vehicles, with male drivers searching for 32 minutes and women for 20 minutes. Over the course of a lifetime this means that absent-minded Brits can spend almost three days trying to find their misplaced motors.
With the rise in mega-supermarkets and mammoth out-of-town retail parks, it’s also no great revelation that the supermarket is the most common place to lose a car. According to Direct Line, this is followed by multi-storey car parks and shopping centres on the edge of towns.
Rob Miles, director of motor at Direct Line, said: ‘The fast pace and busy nature of everyday life often means that when it comes to driving, many drivers often park in a hurry and forget to take note of where they’ve left their car. A simple way to fix this is to take a photograph of the car’s location, that way it’s easy to see the zone or level when you return back.’
Words to live by. Just don’t forget your phone.
Helen Nugent is Online Money Editor of The Spectator
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