Today, the German Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) published new figures on indebtedness among German consumers for the year of 2021. During the Corona Pandemic, online shopping among consumers increased sharply and may have led to financial difficulties for some. Among the 575,000 people who sought help from a debt counseling center in 2021, 28 percent had debts to online retailers or mail-order companies.
These figures originate from the 2021 German over-indebtedness statistic, which is based on anonymized data from 147,000 people who received counseling with their consent and were provided by 593 of the approximately 1,400 debt counseling centers in Germany.
These are further details:
- Of the 575,000 consumers, a total of 28 percent sought debt counseling due to debts with online and mail-order companies in 2021. In 2016, that figure was still at 25.
- This specific debt burden amounted to an average of 587 Euro and corresponded to approximately two percent of the total average debt.
- There was only a little proportional difference between women and men doing online shopping. Nevertheless, 35 percent of women had a debt burden from online purchases averaging 779 Euro, compared with 23 percent of men at 425 Euro.
- Especially younger consumers were likely to be in debt to online retailers. 38 percent of the 20- to 24-year-olds were in dept, while this figure sinks to only 21 percent among 55- to 64-year-olds.
Source: Destatis
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