Christmas shoppers spend less this year

Tuesday, 22 December 2009 12:00

People are spending less this Christmas than they did last year, according to the latest credit card data.

The number of credit and debit card payments processed on Saturday showed transactions peaked at 370 per second at 12.48pm.

But the data, recorded on the final Saturday before Christmas by Barclaycard, showed the number of transactions was down compared to the same day in 2008.

Spending fell by 2.6 per cent this year, and individual transactions were down by 7 per cent.

Stuart Neal, head of UK payment acceptance at Barclaycard, said: "What we have seen over the busiest weekend of the year in the retail industry is a fall overall in terms of spending, but continued increases in areas where you would expect at Christmas such as supermarkets and department stores."

In supermarkets spending on cards was up by 15.2 per cent, said Barclaycard. Service station card spending soared by 24.9 per cent and in department store card activity was up by 18 per cent.

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