Christmas preparations are more important than personal finances and careers

It may only be one day of the year, but in the winter months preparing for Christmas takes priority over both personal finances and career.

A survey by Scottish Widows reveals that 37% of people take time off work to do their Christmas shopping, with an estimated 1.7 million people expected to ‘pull a sickie’ or ‘fake a doctors appointment’ in order to finish their Christmas preparations this year.

Of those saying they would take time off work for Christmas preparations, the younger generation appears to be most likely to fake ‘illness’: over 320,000 18-24 year olds (6%) are expected to take a ‘sickie’ this Christmas to buy presents for friends and family.

Regionally, Londoners throw the lowest level of ‘Christmas sickies’, with only 2% of people faking illness to go shopping, while Edinburgh tops the chart, with 14% of people expecting to make pretend excuses in order to hit the shops this year.

Women are far more prepared for Christmas than men, with 82% buying Christmas presents in November or earlier, in contrast to only 55% of men. Women are also less likely to buy presents at the last minute, while 37% of men will leave it until the week before Christmas, or even later, to buy presents, as opposed to 14% of women. A very tardy 7% of men will leave it right until Christmas Eve or Christmas Day to buy their gifts.

Not only do they buy them earlier but women also spend far longer finding gifts, with 79% spending anywhere between a day and a month searching for the perfect present. This is in contrast to men, 28% of whom will spend half a day or less looking for presents.

George Andrew, Head of Market Relations at Scottish Widows, commenting on the results said: “It seems that the time we are prepared to spend on buying presents for Christmas heavily outweighs the time we are willing to spend on our personal finances. Our research shows that, on average, we spend more time choosing a Christmas present for someone else than we spend on choosing a pension for ourselves. Of course we all love the excitement of giving and receiving presents, but it’s clear that we should be giving more time and thought to our finances – after all Christmas is only one day of the year but good financial planning can set you up for a lifetime.”