LONDON – British consumer spending edged up in the week to Feb. 17, but other measures were hurt by a series of winter storms which hit the country, weekly data from the Office for National Statistics showed on Thursday.
Consumer credit and debit card spending data provided by the Bank of England showed the value of transactions rose to 98% of its February 2020 level in the week to Feb. 17 from 96% the week before, the ONS said.
Retail footfall in the week to Feb. 19 was down by 4% from the previous week at 74% of its 2019 level, while the number of restaurant reservations in the week to Feb. 21 was down by 10 percentage points at 119% of its February 2020 level.
The fall in restaurant reservations partly reflected the fact that Valentine’s Day fell in a different week in 2020, the ONS said.
(Reporting by David Milliken, Editing by Kylie MacLellan)
