The numbers of people purchasing financial products over the Internet has surged, according to a new Mori poll commissioned by Screentrade, the UK online insurance supermarket.
Extrapolating from its survey of nearly 2000 UK consumers, Mori estimates that 2.3 million people are now buying or arranging their finances online, an increase of over 18% from just six months ago. The number of people managing their money on the Internet has also soared to 7.1 million from 3.1 million when Screentrade first conducted the survey with Mori in June 1999.
The research, carried out every six months to chart the changes in Internet use amongst consumers, also shows nearly half of online users have searched the Web in the past 12 months for information about financial services. The most popular personal finance products investigated on the Internet are car insurance (21%), followed by stocks and shares (14%) and current accounts (13%).
It's not all plain sailing, however. One per cent of those interviewed claim to have fallen victim to Internet credit card fraud, while 17 per cent say a site has crashed before completing a transaction. Despite the problems, the survey found that the main reason people buy online continues to be for ease, convenience and speed.