Swiss spend nine hours a week online

Swiss Internet users spend nine hours per week online, and nearly half of all Swiss users have already bought goods and services via the Internet, according to a new poll.

Swiss Internet users spend nine hours per week online, and nearly half of all Swiss users have already bought goods and services via the Internet, according to a new poll.

The research was carried out by leading market research company Wemf and published on Tuesday. The poll found that Internet users spend just over one hour on the web each day, including weekends.

Search engines, provider portal sites and webpages of established print media are the most widely-used online offers.

While many web-lovers frequently use e-mail, enter chat rooms, look up train timetables and telephone directories, the Internet also increasingly proves popular for further education, shopping, weather forecasts and job search.

Almost have of those polled said they had used the Internet at least once to buy something. About 35 percent of those said they had carried out the purchase in the past six months.

Books are proving to be very popular in the e-commerce sector, as well as concert tickets and hotel bookings.

Experts estimate that the number of people using the Internet in Europe will likely double by the year 2003. About 60 million people are expected to be hooked up to the Internet by then in France, the Netherlands, Britain, Sweden and Germany.

From staff and wire reports.