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The announcement was made following news that Amazon has made only its second ever quarterly profit.

The Super Saver Delivery option, an extension of a trial promotion launched before Christmas, means that customers who spend over the £39 threshold will save around £2.75 p&p on a book and £1.45 on a CD.

The move follows a similar announcement in the US although there the level for free delivery is $25

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and just 20 Euros in France and Germany. Amazon.co.uk says that the threshold for free shipping in the US, France and Germany has been trialled for much longer and that the UK benefits from more 'special offers' such as top selling CDs by Robbie Williams and Craig David for just £8.49. Amazon does have a point inasmuch as Robbie Williams Escapology is currently 16.11 Euros (£10.68) on Amazon.fr.

However, UK customers might feel that this is another example of 'Ripoff Britain'. They might feel that Amazon is pitching the threshold higher in the UK to see if British buyers are more willing to accept a higher order price to receive free delivery.

The world wide price cutting and free delivery strategy towards the end of last year helped the company deliver a 28 per cent growth in sales in the fourth quarter of 2002 to $1.43bn. As a result Amazon made a pro forma profit (which excludes a number of costs the company incurred) of $75m. However, Amazon still made a loss on the year of $149m.