Shoppers kept off UK shops in run up to Christmas

The run up to Christmas saw shoppers desert British shops as hard-pressed consumers preferred to keep away from the high street, out of town retailers and shopping centres.

Online sales shot up to over 10 per cent of total sales, leaving traditional shops bearing the brunt of the country's economic woes.

In the month before, a number of British business establishments entered administration as total retail footfall fell 1.2 per cent year-on-year.

The spending power of consumers has been eroding thanks to high inflation and low wage with fears over a triple dip recession also helping to keep curb consumer spending.

The figures released by the British Retail Consortium (BRC) show high street shops suffered a 0.5 per cent fall in visitor numbers, with 1 per cent fewer shoppers coming to out of town destinations and shopping centres receiving 2.8 per cent fewer trips.

The picture was even worse for the year as a whole with high street footfalls plunging 3.3 per cent.

According to BRC boss Helen Dickinson, weak spending power was keeping people away and compounding long-standing difficulties in many of our town centres. She added, this month's retail failures confirmed that the challenges were far from over.

Meanwhile, the overall cost of retail crime in the UK soared 15.6 per cent to £1.6 billion in a year as the sector was targeted by serious, organised criminals.

However, according to the BRC's Retail Crime Survey, the proportion of shoplifting incidents reported to police had fallen to one in eight, suggesting that officially reported crime could be the tip of the iceberg.

Included under the £1.6 billion figure is retail crime of all types and includes the value of goods stolen and damage done plus retailers' expenditure on preventive measures.

The survey gathered data from 44 retail groups – 58 per cent of the sector by turnover - in its most comprehensive crime survey so far.

It found that around one in 20 stores had been robbed during the year, with the average cost of each incident tripling to £3,005, from £989 the previous year, a result of more organised offending.

Significantly, e-crime constituted the most costly form of retail crime, accounting for 37 per cent of the total, while  fraud accounted for 26 per cent of the total cost of retail crime last year. All types of fraud were up, with identity fraud increasing 80 per cent.