March 2016 – Technology moving so fast

Are you keeping up? Is it me or is technology moving so fast that it’s difficult to keep up? Almost every day something else moves on line, or a new service, gadget, or gizmo becomes available. When I started in business the post was too heavy for the postman to carry and it was delivered by a Royal Mail van. Just ten years ago Lyn spent two hours a day opening and filing the paperwork. What a change, the tiny amount of stuff that arrives by post is almost negligible and is dealt with in five minutes. But email, well there’s another story – I typically get 350 emails a day dropping into my Inbox. Even The Royal Mail communicates with us by Email! I think that you might find the following 2015 facts from the Office for National Statistics interesting: • The internet was accessed every day, or almost every day, by 78% of adults (39.3 million) in Great Britain in 2015, compared with 35% (16.2 million) in 2006, when directly comparable records began • Almost all adults aged 16 to 24 (96%) accessed the internet “on the go”, compared with only 29% of those aged 65 years and over • Social networking was used by 61% of adults, and of those, 79% did so every day or almost every day • In 2015, 76% of adults bought goods or services online, up from 53% in 2008. “Clothes or sports goods” were purchased by 55% of adults, making them the most popular online purchase • In the last 3 months, 22% of adults purchased online once or twice, while 28% of adults purchased 11 or more times. Online purchases totalling £100 to £499 were made by 42% of adults who had bought online in the last 3 months • In 2015, 86% of households in Great Britain (22.5 million) had internet access, up from 57% in 2006 The fact that you are reading this eNewsletter means that you are one of the winners but spare a thought for those who have been left behind, I really don’t know how they manage. We are trying to keep up and this week we have launched a business Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/Interface.IFA/ – I would be really pleased if you log in and click ‘Like’. And just to give you something to think about: in December 2014 I bought my new car on line – the first time I saw it was when I was driving it away from the Ford garage where I had arranged to pick it up.