• by Newswire Report , August 4, 2003

Nielsen//NetRatings reports that traffic to the U.S. Department of Treasury jumped 77% during the week ending July 27. With the first set of refund checks mailed out on July 25, surfers from home logged on to check the status of their refunds.

Traffic to the U.S. Department of Treasury jumped from 742,000 surfers during the week ending July 20, to more than 1.3 million unique visitors during the week ending July 27. More than 65% of the site's audience visited the IRS Web page containing information about the Child Tax Credit Refund.

"The Internet provides a low cost delivery channel for government agencies, providing up-to-date and easily accessible information to the public," said Patrick Thomas, senior Internet analyst, Nielsen//NetRatings.

Additionally, in the weekly report, NetRatings said that as the Tour de France drew to a close Sunday, July 27th, bike fans raced online for up to the minute stats on the winner of each stage. Traffic to the official Tour de France site jumped 39% to 286,000 unique visitors, at home, for the week ending July 27th.

Also, with football season just around the corner, traffic to the NFL Internet Network spiked 80%, at work, for the week ending July 27th, according to Nielsen//NetRatings. The site attracted 1.1 million unique visitors compared to nearly 600,000 the week prior.