The winter weather is encouraging motorists to buy winter tyres, but stocks are running low, What Car? has found.

What Car? editor-in-chief Steve Fowler said: “We’ve been inundated with queries from readers seeking advice on winter tyres, and many people have told us they are hard to locate. So we decided to put the What Car? mystery shop team to work to see what the situation is up and down the country.”

The What Car? shoppers called 40 tyre outlets all over the country and discovered that finding winter tyres for the two most popular cars in the country, the Ford Focus and the BMW 3 Series, was much harder than expected.

More than 87% of places called said they were waiting for their next deliveries, which are scheduled for late January/early February. Some outlets claimed that the inclement weather was slowing their deliveries and stating they’d have tyres by the end of the week.

Finding tyres for the BMW proved the more problematic. While many outlets were able to provide suitably sized standard winter tyres, none had the run-flat winter tyres that BMW recommends you fit.

Steve Fowler said: “If climate change is going to bring us much colder winters, we believe the Government should look at making a tyre change compulsory in winter, as it is in other countries. It would help to ensure that the country keeps moving safely and that motorists have more grip and confidence behind the wheel.”