Credit card industry tells people to shop online

APACS has released its top Christmas tips, including telling people to shop online for presents this Yuletide.

11:54 06 December 2004

The body representing the credit card industry, APACS, has released its top Christmas tips, including telling people to shop online for presents this Yuletide.

APACS has predicted that in the UK 27 billion will be spent on debit and credit cards over the holiday season.

"This Christmas we expect more people to be handing over plastic than cash than ever before. We've moved away from cash and cheques because our cards are accepted in more places than ever before and because we know our cards are safer - particularly now that we are regularly using chip and pin, the world-leading anti-fraud measure," said Sandra Quinn, director of communications at APACS.

"We are reminding all consumers to plan their Christmas shopping and budgets early and to be very clear about what they can afford to spend, and how they want to spend it," she added.

APACS has offered consumers some simple tips for the holiday period.

These include budgeting for what you intend to spend on gifts, and remembering that living and socialising costs tend to go up over Christmas.

It also advises consumers to shop online, a piece of advice echoed by new figures from UK Online Centres.

This organisation took a list of ten holiday favourites and discovered that it cost 1,128.88 in the high street but only 761.90 online.

"Internet use is shooting up and recent figures show a very large increase from one year to the next. There are some real bargains," said Jeremy Baker, senior lecturer in marketing at London Metropolitan University.

APACS also advises consumers to keep their receipts and check them against their bills, keep their card safe and not tell their pin number to anyone.