The Maltese are spending at least €40 million online every year – just under one per cent of the total spent by households – according to the National Statistics Office.
However, the NSO says the figure is an estimate and the reality could be even higher.
The loss of business to online retailers has been highlighted repeatedly by locals but, so far, no figures have emerged to indicate the scale of the issue.
However, many commentators – from constituted bodies to politicians – have speculated on the figures, perhaps not aware that the NSO has been compiling statistics from various sources.
“Internal calculations indicate that consumers spend €40 million online. We are cross-checking this against other sources of information and if it is too conservative then we will obviously revise it upwards,” NSO director general Michael Pace Ross said.
The NSO has considerably more information than people assume. For example, major online retailers are actually obliged to report aggregate sales to the relevant EU member states for statistical purposes relating to trade.
Maltapost also send “literally boxes of documentation” every month – it handled €14m worth of orders in 2013 of which €12.6m were from within the EU – and some other dispatch agencies also send information, Mr Pace Ross said, all of which is inputted. And online purchases by businesses are also captured through their VAT declarations, he reassured.
“Of course, we are constantly on the lookout to make our data more accurate,” he said. There are a number of planned initiatives which will help. The next Household Budgetary Survey will be carried out between January and December 2015. The NSO plans to update the basket of goods and services that it monitors – and will include a section on online purchases.
The results would give the NSO a good indication of whether the current estimates are close to the actual ones.
It is also using an EU grant to carry out a survey on ICT usage which will also look at online purchases, and will also help by providing a European benchmark against which to compare local trends.
The survey would encompass some 1,500 households and would ask just a few questions on what they bought as well as how much they spent over the previous few weeks or months.