The number of people seeking advice about unemployment has increased by more than half across Kent.

Figures released this week reveal that Kent's Citizens Advice Bureaux have had an influx of visitors seeking advice about applying for jobs, redundancy and claiming job seekers allowance.

Staff are preparing themselves for even more traffic after Christmas as they believe many businesses are holding off making redundancies until after the festive spending spree.

Peter Gullet, the advice work supervisor for the Tunbridge Wells branch, calls it the 'Woolies syndrome'.

He said: "On a lower level, other companies are doing the same thing as Woolworths as the public are spending far more than they do during the rest of the year.

"When it comes to January they'll need to take a cold, hard look at the situation and will start making big layoffs."

Canterbury

In Canterbury the number of people coming into the local CAB with work concerns has nearly doubled in the past year.

The first half of 2008 saw 590 enquiries compared to 351 for the same period in 2007.

Most of the visits are from people who have lost their jobs or are about to be made redundant.

District manager for Canterbury and Herne Bay Simone Field thinks they have been heavily affected early on because of the nature of work available in the area.

She said: "We have lots of part-time, low-paid work here, which make up a large proportion of the people affected so far in the jobs market."

West Kent

The west of the county has had a slower slide into unemployment than the east.

The Tunbridge Wells office has seen just a 20 percent increase in people with work queries so far.

The low figure has been put down to the large number of residents who commute to the capital.

Mr Tullett said it is only a matter of time.

He said: "Employment is on a two-tier level here, with lower paid industries on one level and city workers on the other.

"Traditionally we have seen little of the full-salaried people and get lots of transient workers.

"The signs are that this is just starting though, we have yet to see the huge impact.

"Banks are big businesses will make big cuts in the new year in London and that's when we'll see those types of people coming in."

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Research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development (CIPD) and KPMG shows a quarter of UK employers have drawn up plans to make redundancies in 2009.

The county appears to be faring better than the majority of England and Wales though, with CABs across the two countries seeing on average a rise of 125 per cent in work related enquiries since April of this year.