Credit-fuelled shopping addictions are causing serious damage to the nation's personal finances according to a new study.
Britons are risking falling into a debt spiral due to their own excessive shopping habits, it has been revealed.
The trend comes despite the ongoing credit crunch - which has made it harder for customers to secure cards and personal loans on the high street and put pressure on budgets up and down the country. Kensington also suggested that shopping addiction was a large problem in society, contrasting the relatively high numbers of sufferers when compared to those with a gambling problem (0.5 percent of the population).
According to the poll, one in four "shoporexics" use unsecured credit to buy "non-essentials". Half of all poll respondents said that shopping makes them "happy" - but a similar number confirmed that they had debts of over £2,500 as a consequence and four in ten said that they felt "guilty" after going on a spree. Stuart Parkin from Kensington Financial Management Consultants said: "We wanted to investigate the extent of shopping-related debt and to give people a gentle reminder of the more serious issues involved. Shopping can be fun, frivolous and great escapism, but serious addiction – and escalating debt - is a very different story."
Elsewhere on the survey, 84 percent indicated that they indulged in impulse-buying on occasion.
