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As the wedding season draws to a close, research reveals how thoughtless and stingy British guests can be.

A cheeky 41 per cent of Britons have repurposed something from their own home to give it as a gift to the happy couple, while one in five have signed their name on another guest's gift.

One in 10 have even lied to the newlyweds by telling them their gift is on its way, when in fact they haven't even bought it.

And it's not just what to buy that's keeping Brits awake at night - but how much to spend, according to the survey of 1,536 adults.

A tenth of respondents admit that they overspend in an attempt to not look cheap, with £32 being the minimum the average person can spend without looking like a skinflint.

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And with gifts being the largest costs incurred by British wedding guests, who on average fork out £215 on each wedding they attend, it's perhaps not surprising that 14 per cent of those surveyed confess to having turned up to a wedding without a gift at all.

And a stingy seven per cent admit they would prefer not to give gifts to newlyweds, if they had a choice.

However, when it comes to guests at their own weddings, Britons think they should be given gifts costing £52, despite only being prepared to spend £46 themselves on a gift for someone else's nuptials.

The data also shows just how unpopular wedding lists are - with one in five adults disliking being told what to buy. Instead, they prefer to give more traditional gifts, such as items for the home or financial contributions towards the honeymoon.

Manchester is found to be the most generous city when it comes to buying wedding gifts according to the research, with an average spend of £66.22 per wedding gift.

Newlyweds from Newcastle should give guests wedding lists to choose from at their own risk, as Geordies are more irritated by this than residents from any other city, with 32 per cent saying they aren't comfortable with being asked to buy from a wedding list.

Wedding guests in Cardiff have been exposed as the most sneaky when it comes to gifting, as 83 per cent admit to having taken something from their own home and given it as a wedding gift.

Aoife Davey, group marketing manager at One4all, the Post Office Gift Card, which commissioned the research, said: 'It's interesting to see the extent to which selecting and buying a gift can stress people out - and also quite alarming how many people have resorted to quite cheeky tactics when the panic has set in.

'It's also clear that British adults prefer to go down the traditional route of selecting a gift for the happy couple themselves, rather than being dictated to by something like a wedding list, and that traditional types of gifts - such as homeware and useful appliances - are still the preferred to choice of many guests.'

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