Retailers may be feeling panicky in the run-up to Christmas this year, with one-off sales and store closures dominating the headlines, but online traders are threatening to buck the trend and enjoy an improved Christmas in 2008.

According to research by Deloitte, the advisory firm, total online spending this year will reach £4.7 billion, up 10 per cent on last year's £4.2 billion, Deloitte's survey suggests that online shoppers are planning to spend an average of £772 overall this Christmas, compared with £655 for the total population.

Ian Geddes, lead retail consulting partner at Deloitte, said that,although the overall numbers of consumers using the internet for Christmas shopping was stable, they were using the internet more often and were spending more online than before.

The research also confirmed that retailers were taking advantage of the internet, with 81 per cent offering an online service, up from 71 per cent last year. However, for 56 per cent of retailers, online sales account for less than 10 per cent of total sales.

The popularity of online shopping in the face of high street gloom was confirmed last month by Asos, the online fashion retailer, which revealed a 68 per cent rise in first-half pre-tax profits to £4.1 million. Shoppers are also looking to the web for promotions, with data from Hitwise showing the number of UK internet searches for voucher websites in October up 133 per cent on the previous year.

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