Shoppers look to spend big on Cyber Monday

Almost three-quarters (70 per cent) of UK shoppers plan to spend an average of 220 online this Christmas, according to research from OpTier.

But despite the potential financial gains on offer for retailers, they have been warned that slow performing websites could harm e-retail profits. Indeed, one in six shoppers see this as a problem.

"Every year we talk about how online retail sales continue to be robust, but the number of etailers not getting it right is staggering," said Colin Rowland, OpTier's senior vice president of operations for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), in a statement

"If one retailer fails to deliver, shoppers will simply move on until they find one that can. In the online world, retailers can't afford to be caught with their pants down."

Last week, Carrenza chief executive Dan Sutherland said that a failure in the technology behind a retail website could be costly for profits as well as reputation.

The bigger online retailers didn't see problems ahead though, and looked forward to a shopping bonanza.

Collectively, online shoppers are expected to spend between 350 million and 400 million today, with IMRG's director of operations David Smith saying this was due to most people having just been paid.

Andy Street, managing director of John Lewis added in a statement: "Everyone decides what they are going to buy over the weekend then goes to work on Monday, gets on the computer, and makes their purchases."

Amazon expected its busiest Christmas on record, with sales tipped to increase by more than a third (35 per cent).

"We expect this to be our biggest Christmas to date," Brian McBride, chief executive of Amazon UK, said in a statement.

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