A survey has shown that Britain's service sector grew more slowly than expected in November, but new business continued to pick up and firms were optimistic.
The CIPS/Markit activity index fell to 56.6 last month from October's two-year high of 56.9. That was the seventh consecutive month above the 50 level that indicates growth. But it was below expectations for a rise to 57.
New business rose for a fourth month in a row and at the fastest pace since September 2007, the PMI survey reported.
'Although growth weakened marginally during November, the recovery of the UK service sector remained intact,' said Paul Smith, a senior economist at Markit. He added that improvements in the forward-looking new orders and business expectations indices raised hopes of 'robust expansion' in the coming months.
The figures show Britain's service sector - which accounts for around three-quarters of the economy - has now grown for seven months running. Markit said the survey suggested the service sector was on course for a quarterly expansion of around 1% in the fourth quarter.
But recent PMI surveys have not been matched by the official national data and some analysts worry that problems inherent with sentiment-based indices mean the PMI figures are overstating the true picture. Britain's economy shrank 0.3% in the third quarter after a contraction in services output that surprised economists given the PMI survey had reported activity growth throughout the period.
