Clickmas shopping boom

TWO MILLION BRITS are expected to virtually throw their cash around online today, as Internet shops up the ante to steal business from the high street.

A whopping 320 million quid is expected to change online hands according to Internet Trade research outfit IMRG, which also reckons e-shops are set to suck in about 13 billion pounds overall as Britain goes Christmas shopping mad. This is up by about 15 per cent on last year's figures.

According to IMRG's research, 59 per cent of punters said they used the high street as a sort of real world catalogue, checking goods out before going home and buying them online.

A whopping 77 per cent admitted they would be doing at least 50 per cent of their festive shopping online, up from just 56 per cent last year.

The massive boom in online shopping seems to negate any concerns punters might claim to have about goods being out of stock or delayed in the seasonal postal sludge, with even credit card company Visa noting that a full 15 per cent of purchases being made this month are Internet shopping related. µ