Every year 700,000 motorists shunt, scrape or prang another parked car, resulting in an estimated £1.25 billion repair bill.

Analysis of more than 100,000 accidents between 2006 and 2008 revealed that around one-in-five of all reported road incidents involved damage to a parked vehicle.

With the cost of repair averaging £1,800, about 80% of these parked car incidents (PCIs) occurred on the street and the remainder in public car parks.

London topped the 25 worst cities in Britain for PCIs, followed by Glasgow, Birmingham, Manchester and Norwich.

Nearly one-in-10 PCI crashes handled by Accident Exchange were recorded in the capital, resulting in an annual repair bill of £119m.

In comparison, with only 197,000 registered cars in the city, Glasgow drivers racked up an annual repair bill of £23.8million making it the second worst parking spot in the UK.

Contributing factors to the PCI problem are increased congestion on residential streets and competition for car park spaces.

“The problem is only set to get worse,” said Steve Evans, chief executive of Accident Exchange. “The number of vehicles on Britain’s roads has swelled by almost 10m over the past decade, leaving 35m motorists competing for an estimated 2.2m car park spaces today.

“The real fear is that one day soon, we will have PCI hot spots where nearby residents could even be priced out of insuring their vehicles,” adds Evans.