Several disgruntled customers from Marks & Spencer contacted the Evening Telegraph to complain they had been waiting for over two hours to collect pre-ordered Christmas food.

Councillor Chris Hind was one, and he described the situation as “a shambles”.

He said, “There is a two-hour wait for food orders and there are police outside trying to organise the traffic situation. It is a total shambles.”

Another angry customer said, “I have been queuing for my Christmas order for an hour and a half and have now been told that it will be another hour.

“It is really shocking that a well-known store of this size is so badly organised. They must have known how many people were coming for their food orders.

“There are elderly people and children waiting as well. It is not the fault of staff as they are giving people sweets and cold drinks while they are waiting.”

A spokesperson for the store said, “We are extremely sorry that customers who have placed food orders from our Dundee store are experiencing collection delays.

“We have unfortunately been adversely affected by last night’s lengthy closure of the M1 which is key to our distribution network. This closure resulted in the late delivery of product to our distribution centre with a knock-on effect for some stores.

“Our staff at Dundee are working hard to satisfy customer orders and where necessary bringing in product from other stores. In order to ensure that we can deliver orders to customers we will be using local taxi services to supplement our own fleet of vans.

“For those customers waiting to collect their orders at the store, our staff are making their waiting time as pleasant as possible by offering refreshments of various kinds.”

Shopping centres and supermarkets were also bombarded with thousands of buyers making their last purchases of presents and food for Christmas dinner.

With Dundee schools coming off for their Christmas holidays yesterday lunchtime, and many other workers having completed their final day of work, the town centre and supermarkets have experienced a rise in customers.

John Morton, manager of the Wellgate Centre, estimated that yesterday had been the centre’s busiest trading day of the year. “We were absolutely mobbed,” he said.

It appeared that despite the large amount of sales that had gone through, there were still plenty of present hunters hitting the pavement this Christmas Eve.

“I am looking out into the Murraygate now and it looks like things are staring to get very busy again today.

“Most of the stores in the Wellgate are choosing to close around three or four o’clock, but the centre will remain open until 6pm for any real last-minute buys.”

Food shopping is, of course, an essential part of everyone’s Christmas Day and supermarkets have been open around the clock to cope with the demand.

A spokesperson from Tesco Extra, on Kingsway, said today he didn’t know exactly what takings had been so far for this Christmas but claimed it was “an awful lot”.

“We have surpassed all of our expectations in terms of budgets. This has been a bumper Christmas, as far as takings are concerned, and with a fantastic stock. With plenty of turkeys left, things are looking good.”

A member of staff at Asda Milton said, although they were unable to disclose figures, their store had been “absolutely packed” right through the night. Extra car park staff from an outside security company were drafted in last week to help with marshalling in the car park and have been “run off their feet”.

The manager of Sainsburys at Claypotts said things were running smoothly and that there was still a good selection of fresh produce on offer. He expected a rush in early afternoon, but said they had ample car park space to cope.

A spokesperson from Safeway also said that last minute shopping appeared to have “gone well” because of the well stocked shelves.

Dundee shoppers also faced a cash dry-up with many ATM machines in the city centre said to be empty.

One — the small Halifax Bank of Scotland branch on the upper level of the Overgate —was reported yesterday to be unable to process cash withdrawals. A spokesman for the bank said, “Cash machines can be overwhelmed when there is a sudden surge. The Overgate has been building up in recent times and now has more shops and an increased clientele, inevitably leads to an increased demand.”

Lloyds TSB has experienced a 10% increase on withdrawals in the run-up to Christmas.

A spokesman for the Royal Bank of Scotland said machines will be re-stocked today if they run-out. Similarly, a Clydesdale Bank spokesman said “activity is what we would expect”.