Britons spent 14 million hours trawling websites yesterday

Sales records fall across the country as fears of a quiet Christmas prove unfounded

Two of Britain's highest-profile female chief executives may have quit in recent weeks but the overall number of female directors in Britain has increased by 24 per cent over the past five years.

Almost £5bn of unpaid debt is left behind by businesses that close down each year – on top of the £11bn debts left by insolvent firms, figures published today reveal.

Q. I have taken out about 10 loan and credit card agreements in the last decade. Whenever I was asked whether I wished to take out a PPI [payment protection insurance] policy, I always declined.

Fresh signs of optimism for the economy emerged from expectations of a strong quarter from "back-office" support service firms that act as a barometer for corporate Britain.

The credit-checking giant Experian yesterday displayed its appetite for fast-growing Latin American markets, spending $1.5bn (£938m) to buy the 29.6 per cent of the Brazilian credit bureau Serasa that it does not already own.

Outlook It is tempting to believe that everything is done and dusted at Standard Chartered.

Prime Minister David Cameron is calling on people to come back into London after criticisms that the capital has become a 'ghost town' due to commuters and non-Games tourists avoiding the centre.  

Revenues at Experian grew by 14 per cent in its first quarter, driven by the global credit-rating checker's fast-growing Latin American business.

Current account fraud has reached its highest level in at least three years, mainly due to people lying about the state of their finances, a study suggested today.

Slough is officially Britain's identity fraud capital, overtaking London for the first time. The Berkshire commuter town's residents are targeted about four times more than the national average, according to the credit checking group Experian.

Credit-checking group Experian yesterday finally unloaded its price-comparison website PriceGrabber and two related businesses for considerably less than it paid in 2005.