December arrives, the weather takes a turn for the worse, relatives' and loved-ones' Christmas lists arrive by the dozens, and since you've grown up, Santa doesn't seem to be pulling his weight. All in all the winter months have a tendency to be a time to dread rather than a time for cheer.

Once again, however, technology has come to our aid. Now, instead of trawling around the shops, weighed down by bag after bag of presents, Christmas shopping is no further than a mouse-click away. From the comfort of your own home you can purchase a set of floral tea towels for your dear old Nan and a new Nintendo Wii for your favourite Nephew (or the other way ‘round!) all from the same source - the Internet.

With the ease of the process, and increased user familiarity with the Internet, it is little wonder that online Christmas sales figures have soared in recent years. Indeed, one national newspaper estimated a record-breaking £14bn worth of Christmas shopping being spent online in the UK this year - making the UK Europe's most dedicated online shoppers during the festive period.

However, like the risk of buying your dear old Nan a games console, the reception of the gift is something the Internet cannot guarantee. And so not all the money spent this Christmas will have been money well spent. A recent survey showed four out of five people are likely to receive presents that they either don't want or don't like, while Abbey Bank estimated the total money spent on unwanted or novelty gifts this Christmas as being a whopping £1.3bn.

Again, however, the Internet has come to the rescue; working from the belief that ‘one person's rubbish is another's treasure' (or that one person's weird white box with a weird white stick is another's prized gaming machine), people up and down the country have started using online UK classifieds as a way of sorting out the problem of unwanted Christmas presents. Rather than braving the shops during the January sales in order to return unwanted items to a variety of stores that may only offer an exchange for something else that you don't want, online classifieds offer users the opportunity to sell all of their unwanted gifts - again from the comfort of their own homes.

It could be said, then, that with the help of UK classifieds and the Internet, Santa Claus can work right into the New Year, making unwanted presents, wanted.

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