Shopping activity has been down on every year since 2019. Photo: RNZ / Rebekah Parsons-King
There were 10,805 transactions processed in New Zealand's peak shopping minute this year, which fell on Friday at 12.28pm.
Wordline has released its data showing the payments made through its network in the shopping days leading up to Christmas.
The peak shopping hour was between 12pm and 1pm on Friday, when 626,692 transactions were processed.
The peak transactions-per-second was 186 at exactly 12.24 that day.
But shopping activity is down on every year since 2019. The record peak hour remains 2019, when 67,436 transactions were recorded between 12pm and 1pm on Christmas Eve.
Infometrics chief executive Brad Olsen said the data pointed to a busy Christmas, but one with fewer transactions and purchases, as the cost of living pressure hit.
"Spending trends released earlier this week by Wordlline showed an increase in spending values compared to last year, and given inflation over the last year means many items are more expensive, it's likely Kiwis are spending more on getting fewer items," he said.
"With Christmas falling on a Monday in 2023, Kiwis have had to balance last-minute gift buying with gift availability, with more places closed on Saturday and Sunday than on Friday. In 2019, 2020, and 2021, the busiest shopping day was Christmas Eve, but 2022 and 2023 have seen the Friday before Christmas (with Christmas on a Sunday in 2022 and on Monday in 2023) be the busiest shopping day.
"But we are hedging that bet with leaving the shopping a bit later than before, with the peak minute and peak second for transactions in the lead up to Christmas 2023 being considerably later than other years. The 2023 peak minute was at 12.28pm, later than the 12.09-12.13pm times in 2020-2022, and the peak second occurred around 12:24pm, later than the 12:06-12:16pm timeframes in 2019-2022."
He said both peak hourly transactions and peak transactions-per-second were down 3% from 2022, despite a bigger population.
"Although these are only peak rather than total transaction numbers, looking at the annual trends for these peak transactions alongside other spending date suggests that Kiwis have had to pay for more expensive presents this year, they're more cautious about their spending, so they've possibly cut down on the number of presents to afford the value of that really good present.
"All eyes now turn to Boxing Day to see how good the specials might be, and if that can coax more spending out of cautious consumers."
This story was originally [ https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/money/301032259/186-transactions-in-a-second-heres-how-christmas-shopping-this-year-compares published on Stuff.]