Well, my laptop arrived when expected today and was very well packed. Documentation inside showed that it had been repaired on 24/09/19 with instructions to return to me on 07/10/19 (when I returned from my holiday) - so HP had got it right all along, except that their CS were totally unaware. They had to email the repair shop to find out the status and I expected them to phone me back, all I got was the standard HP email saying it had been collected for return to me. This state of affairs does nothing to enhance the reputation of HP, in fact it makes them look like a bunch of back street traders. NOTE TO HP:- Make sure your CS staff have access to repair status info.