From...

March 5, 1999
Web posted at: 7:21 p.m. EST (0021 GMT)

by Sharon Machlis

(IDG) -- It took more than one try to place an order at 10% of online retailers surveyed this holiday season by E-tailing Group Inc. in Chicago, an Internet retail consulting firm.

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Unexpectedly high volume was generally to blame for the problems at those stores, although some sites reported software glitches unrelated to heavy holiday shopping traffic.

Once each quarter, E-tailing Group shoppers make a purchase at each of 50 major Internet stores. In the fourth quarter, those shoppers couldn't successfully make a purchase at 6% of the sites after several attempts -- up from 0% in the third quarter of 1998.

"You would be surprised how many companies don't handle things the way they should," President Lauren Freedman told the Direct Marketing Association's Net.marketing conference in Los Angeles Monday. Other survey highlights included the following:

• 17% of sites did not E-mail confirmation numbers to customers following a purchase;

• Only 13% could perform real-time inventory checks when customers placed an order;

• 30% allowed online tracking of package shipments.