27 July 2007, 13:04 PM

  • The number of retailers going bust has surged by more than 20% between April and June this year, according to the latest figures from credit ratings firm Experian.

During the first six months of the year, the number of business failures in retail rose by four percent to 568.
But between April and June the number going bust was 287 – a massive 21.1% increase on the year before.

Experian’s Jo Howard said the level of failure in retail could reflect “the general slowdown in consumer spending as the five interest rate increases have begun to bite, which means we could see more failures in the coming months.”

The rising number of failures in retail is in contrast to the overall number of corporate failures among UK businesses, which fell by nearly seven percent to 8,390 during the first six months of 2007.

Other sectors showing increased failures included hotels & leisure (up 16%) and agriculture (up 56%).