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E-Commerce Sales

What is e-commerce?

E-commerce, or electronic commerce, includes sales, receipts, and/or revenue from any transaction completed over an Internet, Extranet, Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) network, electronic mail, or other online system. Transactions are agreements between buyers and sellers to transfer ownership of, or rights to use, goods or services. Payment for these goods and services may or may not be made online.

Why are we asking about e-commerce?

The economic census is an important source of information about U.S. economic output. An increasing number of businesses are conducting their business activities by e-commerce. We need to measure the magnitude of this activity to better measure the changing ways in which Americans are doing business.

Which industries will we ask to report about e-commerce?

We will include the question about electronic commerce on nearly every 2002 Economic Census form.

What will we ask?

The e-commerce item requests the dollar value of e-commerce sales, receipts, and/or revenue, excluding sales taxes.