Success! The laptop cable has arrived, and the laptop is working! So HP have come through in the end.

I’m a student. I’d just like to underline that point. I’m a student. £138.65 is what the government think I should spend on books, food, entertainment, and basically anything that isn’t rent or fees for almost ten weeks; it’s about two-and-a-half weeks’ rent. To me, £138.65 is an awful lot of money. So when I spend £138.65 on a Next-Day On-Site Extended Warranty I expect decent service. I accept that parts are sometimes needed, and sometimes go out of stock, but it’s not unreasonable to expect the fault to be fixed within, say, a week, is it? Taking the better part of a month seems excessive.

Advice from other places has informed me that I shouldn’t have had to pay in the first place, as they should have agreed to pre-book a repair when the screen first broke, rather than insisting I send it straight away or have to buy the extended warranty.

I realise I’m a mere minnow in a sea of HP sharks, and that whatever I say means really very little to them – and even less to their bottom line. But my next laptop will be a Toshiba.