Millions of people clear Christmas debt within a month
(16 January 2008)

Approximately 61 per cent of consumers are expected to clear their Christmas expenditure within a month, according to Sainsbury's Bank.

The study also showed that 483,000 people will still be paying their debt after a year.

A further 12 per cent of respondents admitted to not knowing when they would be debt free.

Donald MacLeod, head of cards at Sainsbury's, said: "We estimate that around 18 per cent of Christmas spending was placed on credit cards.

"Our research indicates that around 8.6 million people intended to put half or more of their festive spending on cards."

The research also revealed that women are more unlikely to pay their debt off swiftly, with 71 per cent of those expecting to take a year to pay the debt being female.

Meanwhile, Credit Action has claimed that wages have "exploded in the past few years".

The money education charity stated that there is now a huge divide between the overpaid and the underpaid, which results in many people's wages going up less than the cost of living.