IT'S no good, you just can't put it off any longer. Unless your children are going to go to school in their swimming cossies and flip flops, it's time to buy the school uniform.

And because we think that life's too short to battle round all those racks of grey and navy with stroppy children in tow, we've been trying to make it easy by shopping on the Internet. We tried some specialist sites and some sites of High Street names.

GOOD POINTS

* Plenty of choice in styles and prices

* Most sites are very easy to navigate

BAD POINTS

* Delivery charges in nearly all cases, ranging from £2.95 to £4.95

* Bad pictures on some of the sites, sometimes tricky to see details

* Some of the sites are slow or confusing to use

www.argos.co.uk

Yes, I know you don't think of Argos for school uniform, but they do clothing in their Additions catalogue and that includes schoolwear - some of the cheapest we found.

Boys' long sleeve shirts £4 to £7 for two, depending on size

Boy's pleat trousers £10 to £16

Skirts £7 to £12 for two

Girl's fashion blouses, two for £12

Delivery Charge: £3.95. Free on orders over £100

www.clivemark.co.uk

An easy site to use, promises the cheapest prices for Trutex on the Internet.

Trutex girls' blouses £10.50 to £12.50 for two

Trutex girl's revere blouse £8.50 to £12

Skirts £15 to £18

Trutex trousers £17 to £21

Delivery Charge: £3. Free for three items and over

www.debenhams.co.uk

A horrible site to use. Choice was limited and hard to find. But if your daughter really wants a Jasper Conran designed uniform, this is where she'll find it.

Two long-sleeved shirts £7 to £10

Trousers £9 to £13

Jasper Conran skirt £12 to £16

ID:X stretch skirt £12

Delivery Charge: £2.95. Free for Debenham Gold Card holders

www.littlewoods.com

Easy site to use - as long as you know that you get to it via Littlewoods Extra on the main site.

Two long sleeved shirts £6 to £10 depending on size

Ben Sherman shirt £17 to £20

Pleat front trousers £7 to £12

Pleated skirt £7 to £8

Delivery Charge: £2.95 under £100. Free over £100

www.marksandspencer.co.uk

This site has been out of action for sometime so it's good to have it back. Schoolwear is one of its better sections. Some prices are cheaper than last year and there is NO delivery charge. M&S is trying hard to get us back.

Boys' long sleeve shirts £7 to £14 for two

Non iron trousers £9 to £17

Non iron pleated skirt £11 to £19

Girls' blouses £7 to £14 for two

Delivery Charge: None

www.mothercare.co.uk

Very easy site to use. But it just goes up to age eight - and some items only to age six. The worst thing about this site was the very blurry pictures, but they gave a good written description of each item, so that made up for it.

Boys' shirts £8 for two

Trousers £9

Girls' blouse £7 for two

Skirt £7

Delivery Charge: £3.

www.schoolwear-centre.co.uk

An easy site to use but we found it quite difficult to get information on ordering and delivery. Choice varied, only one style of skirt, but three styles of trousers, for instance.

Boy's classic shirt £5.99 to £7.99

Boy's Trutex baggy shirt £12.99 to £13.99

Pleat front trousers £2.99 to £17.99

Girl's A line skirt £10.99 to £16.99

Delivery charge: £4.95

www.schoolyard.co.uk

Very wide range of clothing including outdoor wear, back packs, waterproofs etc. Some nice touches like "Stirling trousers designed to fit the larger boy." But one of the more expensive sites

Boy's classic shirts £16.50 to £21.50 for two

Pleat front trousers £14.50 to £20.95

Three sorts of skirts, from £7.95 to £27

Pinafore dresses from £12.95

Delivery Charge: £3.50 for three items - three days. £6.50 for next day.

www.woolworths.co.uk

Aarrgghh! We tried this site last week and thought it was brilliant. The best of all, in fact - simple, easy to use and reasonably priced. Then, guess what? We went back to check on something yesterday and schoolwear had gone. Vanished. Apparently they are re-vamping their site and it will soon sell only CDs and videos. Shame.