Online forms -- long scroll or multi page?

Hi,

Some people might consider this to be an old debate that has been solved, or
not. But I am into one like it at my company. 
We have international customers, that is important to know in this. So our
order form can't just be a simple U.S. form with a state pulldown. 
Because of that we have these forms, select country, enter personal shipping
/ billing data, confirm on info up to this point,  enter card data, thankyou
page.  Some people are saying we need to get rid of the country select at
the start, and maybe even include the card data with the already more than
one page personal shipping / billing data page. 

Ok, so here is my opinon, that the number of forms that a person has to fill
out matters less than the size of each form. So a series of forms that are
only a few items that take up a single browser page or less, is better than
a one shot big ass form. And a single big ass form ruins the whole effect of
using multi pages for the forms. My experence has been that people make
mistakes, much more easily when they have to enter data all at once, it is
also a hell of a lot harder to validate an all in one form, vs a form where
you at least know, for example that it is an International customer already. 

So what are your opinons and reasons, big forms vs many smaller forms? 


Thanks,

Eric 

(250) 655 - 9513 (PST Time Zone)

"Inquiry is fatal to certainty." -- Will Durant 

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