Christmas Shoppers Shun High Street to Buy Online

LONDON, December 6, 2011 -

Cyber Monday sees record online transactions for the third year running, with shoppers bingeing during their lunch hour

Sage Pay, the UK’s leading online payment processor, has reported record-breaking transaction volumes on Cyber Monday, the busiest online shopping day of the year for shoppers in the run-up to Christmas.

Sage Pay processed hundreds of thousands of transactions, showing growth of more than 17% compared with this time on Cyber Monday last year. The spending average has also grown to £91 on gifts for friends and family, an increase of £3 over the previous year.

Simon Black, Managing Director, Sage Pay, said: “As the outlook for the UK economy worsens in the wake of Osborne’s Autumn Statement, the public sector strikes and Phillip Green’s threatening to close of over 200 shops across the country, e-tailers can take some solace in the strong growth in online transactions year-on-year. Recent reports have shown that e-commerce now accounts for around 7.2% of the UK’s GDP and there’s a real potential for business in the online space.”

Black continued: “With Monday lunchtime always the most popular time for online shopping, we’ve kept a particular eye on transactions being processed at this time on Cyber Monday. The growth of transactions year-on-year is huge: between 12pm and 2pm we recorded a 4.7% increase in transactions on last year, which is great news for e-tailers.  There was also a spike in transactions towards the end of the working day, at 4pm.

“Among our customers, transactions have been rising steadily over the past couple of weeks as people turn their thoughts to Christmas, but the final pay packet before Christmas and the host of online deals have created a real frenzy among shoppers. With only a couple of weekends to go before Christmas, we’re expecting to break records all the way up to Christmas Eve.”

Sage Pay is a division of FTSE 100 business software company Sage.  It is the UK’s leading payment provider (PSP) and is one of the most trusted e-commerce brands.  Sage Pay processes millions of secure payments for its 36,000 customers each year and makes the process of accepting payments simpler, faster, safer and more profitable for businesses of all sizes.

Contact
Amy Monro
Amy.monro@sagepay.com
+44(0)7595-607-556

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