Electrical retailer Dixons is quitting the high street to go online. It is a shrewd move. Electronics goods have a short life span, and suffer from declining margins from day one, as each item is discounted to make way for the next model. The German electronics retailer Mediamarkt has been struggling with painfully low margins for many years. Since electronics and gadget shoppers are disproportionately likely to be active internet shoppers, it seems sensible to follow them to the Internet, where the next stage of this battle will be fought out in terms of price comparison on the one hand, and in terms of online customer service on the other.

On the topic of customer service, we have recently been attempting to return a dead hard drive to eBuyer and have been unimpressed by being referred to the manufacturer – Hitachi global storage technologies, and then asked to run a diagnostic test ourselves. Sorry, guys, there aren’t enough hours in the day as it is. Just give me a form to print out on the website, make it easy to return it, and I’ll be your customer for life.