When there’s an (albeit modest) emergency, online search engines have become our go-to source for help. But let this sorry tale be a warning to you.

A couple of Saturdays back, I was doing some work in the garden with a lawnmower plugged into an extension cable.

Suddenly, it cut out. When I popped in to see if the plug had fallen out, it was, in fact, smouldering. Not, I surmised, a good sign.

With the power out across the house, I gingerly removed what remained of the plug only to find one of the prongs had melted into the plastic.

It left me in something of a predicament. So I turned to a well-known search engine and asked it to suggest a local electrician. Being without power and a dangerous-looking burnt-out plug wasn’t ideal for a Saturday morning.

Even given my (extremely) limited electrical experience, this was not, I thought, going to be an expensive job – simply a case of replacing the plastic front of the double-socket. I’d been able to unscrew it and could see all inside was in sound order.

The first choice looked good. ‘Family-run’, years of experience and trumpeting it served where I lived; so I dialled the mobile number listed. They’d be there in 30 minutes I was told. Excellent. I swallowed the £50 call-out charge. A small price to pay, I thought, to get an expert to look at it.

Three torturous hours later, and after repeated assurances they were on their way, they finally turned up.

He was, to put it mildly, a funny fellow. Polite conversation was not, it seemed, going to be the order of the day. He took offence, bizarrely, at our asking if he’d been working nearby (‘I’m not saying where I’ve just been,’ was his response), and ‘do you live locally?’ was met with a curt ‘have you seen me about?’. As I say, odd.

Anyway, he looks at the socket and informs me he needs to go and buy a replacement face plate. Do we, he asks, know where a nearby store is?

It is at this point, I’m fearing the worst. I was under the impression this chap worked for a local ‘family-owned’ firm. Surely he knows the hardware stores of Thanet? Such as, for example, the one about 100 yards away.

‘Can I,’ I enquired, ‘just check how much it’s going to cost?’.

‘£450,’ he replied.

Now, as I say, I am no expert. But £450? To replace the fascia of a plug socket? On top of a £50 call-out? I nearly fell over in shock.

The ensuing conversation basically had us saying that figure was ludicrous – him instantly saying he’d do it for £250 instead (quite the negotiator!) – and us then saying can he please leave. Any trust in this chap and his firm now evaporated.

To add insult to injury, he, at first, refused to leave the property until we agreed to the work. The cheek!

He eventually, after this stand-off clearly wasn’t going to get us to part with hundreds of pounds, taped the box up (so the wires he exposed weren’t going to kill us on contact, which he only did begrudgingly) and left with only a call-out charge to his name. He was lucky to get that.

After he’d cleared out, I popped to the aforementioned hardware store and bought a faceplate for £2.50.

On the Monday, we rang a – genuinely – local electrician we’d been recommended. He came round, no call-out charge, fixed it (in about 10 minutes), plus another small issue we had, and charged, in total, £30. Yes, £30. A 94% reduction in the cost.

He was well-qualified, friendly, efficient, clearly knew the area well, and I vowed to use him again. He didn’t threaten a sit-in and was happy to say he’d just been on a job around the corner.

The moral of this story? Avoid, at all costs, those firms at the top of a search page, paying for the prime spot and claiming to be local. They’re not (or, to be clear, not in this case at least). And, if you get unlucky, as I’m going to assume we did (I‘ll give them the benefit of the doubt and not name and shame them here), you could get royally ripped off.

You have been warned. And I’ve learned a valuable lesson.