One in four drivers end up rowing with their sat nav

GETTING lost while driving is a common spark for rows – but the target of our anger is now just as likely to be technology as a passenger.

Almost a quarter of motorists admit to having blazing ‘rows’ with their sat navs.

In a poll of 1,000 drivers, 23 per cent confessed to regularly shouting at their mapping device after it has taken them in the wrong direction.

Their main complaints were being directed into a traffic jam, sent down a dead end or routed farther than expected. However 28 per cent said they would be ‘completely lost’ without their sat nav – even as little as a mile from home.

The poll by Europcar UK found that 40 per cent of those quizzed said they preferred using old-fashioned maps instead of a sat nav and 36 per cent said that if they got lost they would wind down their car window and ask a local. Gary Smith, of the hire car firm, said: ‘There’s no doubt that the reliance on sat nav is increasing.

‘And perhaps arguing with an inanimate device – rather than the passengers – is preferred.’

Richard Grant, of Hastings in East Sussex, said he had broken two sat navs and now relied on a map to find his way around. I’m not the calmest driver at the best of times and I always used to shout at my sat nav,’ said the 35-year-old. ‘I don’t have one any more as I’ve broken the last two.

‘One of them was so rubbish it always seemed to take me on the longest route and the other one kept shutting down.

‘Both of them ended up in the bin after I threw them about in the car in frustration and now I just use a normal road map to find my way around.’

According to the AA Driving School, young drivers play dangerous games of ‘beat the sat nav’ to get to destinations quicker.