KEY POINTS:
New Zealand is having an online shopping boom - internet users spent $585 million last month on new and used goods and services.
And this month there has been a 44 per cent increase in the number of people choosing to do their shopping on the internet.
The fast growth of online shopping is still dwarfed in dollar terms by conventional crowds-and-queues buying. November's $585 million internet spend-up was 32 per cent of the $1823 million spend by shoppers using their eftpos cards in the first two weeks of December alone.
These figures suggest that for every dollar spent online, about $3 is spent in a conventional store.
But the cybershoppers are gaining.
While more than 100 eftpos transactions a second are expected this weekend as retailers go into Christmas overdrive, figures from Paymark show the number of people shopping in cyberspace was up almost 44 per cent on the first two weeks of December last year.
The well-organised started electronic gift buying even earlier, resulting in a 50 per cent increase of the number of internet purchases in November in comparison to the same time last year.
Nielsen Online senior analyst, Tony Boyte, said that last month 1.3 million New Zealand internet users spent $585 million on new and used goods and services - and average of about $450 each.
But these figures could have been inflated by people booking flights and accommodation online.
Although precise figures were not available, Mr Boyte said clothing was the third most popular purchase on the internet, and about 85 per cent of everything bought online came from New Zealand websites.
"Those figures included purchases made on Trade Me so it's not necessarily new goods from retailers."
Paymark Chief executive, Simon Tong, said the number of sales was lower than usual for this time of year.
This suggested some people were either leaving their shopping until the last minute or buying online.
Netguide editor, Jorin Sievers, said the increasing visibility of the internet was making it a more viable and trouble-free option for people not wanting to face the Christmas throng.
"There was a fear of inserting your credit card numbers on the internet some time ago, but people these days are far more trusting knowing these sites are more carefully controlled."
"It's more convenient and the more people know about the internet, the more they realise you don't have to go out and purchase things in stores.
"Things are often cheaper online as well, because they don't need shops to house these goods."
The Herald's technology columnist, Peter Griffin, said popular sites at which people were likely to be buying on the internet included Trade Me, online bookstore Fishpond, Real Groovy and Gameplanet.
