Boxing Day sales comparable to 2008

Huge discounts at Boxing Day sales have drawn shoppers from their homes, with electronic transactions comparable to 2008, according to Eftpos-provider Paymark.

By 4.30pm today, shoppers had spent $77 million in electronic transactions, with 77 transactions per second between noon and 1pm, Paymark chief executive Simon Tong said.

The figures were comparable to Boxing Day last year, but could end slightly lower, Mr Tong said.

On Christmas eve, shoppers spent $226 million in electronic transactions, $10m more than the $216m spent last year.

Shoppers and retailers carried out 4.2m transactions for the day, with a peak of 131 transactions per second between noon and 1pm - breaking all previous records.

Mr Tong said the value for transactions for the month was up about four percent and the volume was up just over 6.5 percent.

"From our point of view, value had either been down or flat all the way through the winter. October, November was up 1.2 percent, but it seems to have been influenced by fuel prices. But December seems to have been strong from the get-go, really."

After the holidays, the company's analysts would look at the figures, to work out where in the country people had been spending, and which sectors fared best.

Newmarket Business Association chief executive Cameron Brewer said the Boxing Day sales had lived up to expectations, despite sunny weather drawing people away from stores and to the beach.

Price reductions at the sales had been "substantial" and well-received by the public, Mr Brewer said.

There was a large emphasis on payment enticements such as hire purchase interest-free and no-deposit offers, along with matching competitors' offers.

Auction website TradeMe said it had had 10,000 new listings since Christmas, and suspected a lot were people trying to sell unwanted gifts, Radio New Zealand reported.

- NZPA