Research conducted by IF found that one in three credit card users simply throw away their credit card receipt slips without first bothering to destroy them.

The company warned that consumers could be making life easier for credit card fraudsters by failing to keep track of their slips.

The survey of 300 credit card users revealed that people also put their credit card receipts to a variety of uses, including wrapping up chewing gums, providing bedding for pet rabbits, making paper aeroplanes to amuse children and writing down their telephone number to give to someone they had just met in a pub among others.

However, some respondents, particularly those who had been victims of credit card fraud, went to great lengths to ensure they destroyed receipts, with some resorting to taking them into work to shred them or pouring boiling hot water and bleach on them to destroy all traces of the card details.

The survey also revealed that the majority of card users don’t even keep their credit card receipts for long enough to check them against their credit card bills:

Commenting, Grenville Turner, IF chief executive said: “People should exercise caution when it comes to disposing of their credit card receipts. Many retailers still print their full card details on these receipts and they can be manna from heaven to fraudsters if people simply throw them away.

“Retailers can play their part too. I would urge more retailers to calibrate their card machines to withhold the full details of an individuals’ card number from their receipts,” he added.

Credit card crime from the fraudulent possession of an individuals card details – where the card wasn’t present – is rising and was up 15 per cent to £110 million last year, accounting for over a quarter of total credit card crime.