It is a MoneySaving nightmare; you are armed with discounted tickets to the theatre, shop vouchers or half price meal deal, then drive to the venue only to find the parking is extortionate and eats up the savings.

But a bit of help may be at hand as a batch of new websites listing free parking spaces have launched. They are not perfect but are worth a look. park-up.com and freeparkingspace.co.uk are the main two and allow you to search simply by popping in post codes, attraction names or popular areas.

Park-up only covers London, but clearly lists free spaces and the cheapest alternatives, including car parks, on-street pay and display sections, motorbike stations and where you can pay by phone.

Freeparkingspace has nationwide coverage but is crowd-sourced (i.e. it relies on people to populate it), which means lots of data collection, but take it with a pinch of salt.

Full pros and cons of all the sites are available at www.moneysavingexpert.com/freeparking