Irish best at buying travel tickets on-line

WHEN it comes to buying holidays or snapping up cheap airline seats on-line, Irish consumers are world beaters.

In a survey of 37 countries, Ireland topped the poll for buying holiday or leisure travel tickets on-line, with 28% of all internet shoppers here securing tickets on the web in the last month.

According to a report by TNS MRBI Interactive, 46% of Irish adults have accessed the internet in the last four weeks, compared to 39% in 2001.

Almost 20% of users here have shopped on-line during that period and one quarter plans to shop on-line during the next six months.

The survey also found that during the last month, Irish web shoppers managed to rack up an average spend of 364 euro, with 41% of purchases on the net costing less than 100 euro and 7% more than 1,000 euro.

These figures compare well with our international counterparts, with the worldwide average of internet users now at 34% and the average number of shoppers estimated at 15% worldwide.

The power of the dollar proved strongest when it came to spending online, however, with Americans buying an average amount of goods worth 1,114 euro on the net. Other key findings of the survey include:

l The most popular place for using the internet in Ireland is at home.

l Most internet users are in the under-20 age range (77%).

l There is a growing number of users in the 20-29 age bracket.

TNS MRBI Interactive director Luke Reaper believed the success of websites like Ryanair, EasyJet and Go had encouraged people to shop online.

“It’s like anything, the more you do something, the easier it gets,” Mr Reaper said.

He said while Ireland’s internet usage was progressing steadily, there were still barriers preventing people from shopping online, with security-related issues the biggest stumbling block.

One quarter of Irish internet users stated that the main reason they had not bought goods online was because they were afraid to divulge their credit card details over the net.

Mr Reaper said the high costs of PCs, call charges and better security when buying something in a store were the other main deterrents to buying online.

“Challenges remain for website and credit card companies to reassure people they won’t be ripped off. But with a 7% increase in the number of people using the internet in the same period last year, that certainly suggests a positive outlook for e-commerce retailers.”