Online giant Amazon.co.uk has announced that Amazon Prime customers living within the M25, or in AL, SL and HP post codes just north of the Greater London area will be able to have Amazon Prime Now free same delivery of any one of up to 1 million items on sale via its website.

This goes head to head with Argos Fast Track that Apex Insight reported today is offering free delivery on all orders over £50 anywhere in the UK until the 24 November. This is a signal of intent on the part of Amazon but to get the same depth of reach across the UK will take significant resources and time to compete with the home shopping store. However Amazon has a much greater inventory of goods on offer so will out compete Argos in terms of the range of goods on offer.

Amazon Prime customers can also have a one hour delivery option for £6.99 in the conurbation. Christopher North, MD of Amazon.co.uk said of the offer, “We know how important speed of delivery is to our Prime customers and we’ve been continuing to invest in our delivery network to offer even more fast delivery options.”

The Prime next day service has been offered for quite some time and is available nationwide. Prime Now was tested in inner London and extended to parts of Birmingham but this is now available to nearly 9 million people in the UK, with 8 million inside the M25.

With Amazon and Argos offering same day delivery services to significant proportions of the UK, it seems only a matter of time before fashion retailers and other online businesses start to offer the same. It seems that for the moment however, there is some caution in the industry by virtue only one national retailer has taken the leap and the international e-commerce giant is only taking a baby step towards the same offering.