Is the “analogue chancellor” denying the poor their rights to computer access? Actually, all the Treasury did in the last Budget was to put an end to the Home Computing Initiative (HCI), an officially sanctioned tax dodge that would have seemed naive even a decade ago.

Industry reaction to the closure of HCI has been universally negative and occasionally hysterical. Thousands of people will now lose their jobs and millions will be prevented from learning IT skills, apparently.

Call me cynical, but PC vendors simply got caught exploiting the system. Not that anyone else comes out with honour; employers were persuaded that tax-free PCs for staff would encourage people to take work home, effectively tricking them into slaving day and night for no extra pay. Employees, on the other hand, saw an opportunity to get a second home PC on the cheap for even more game-playing.

I’m not convinced that employers or staff feel their expectations were met. The only ones to profit from the HCI were the vendors, whose sales were boosted at the taxpayer’s expense. No wonder they have been showering journalists with screaming press releases about nasty Mr Brown.

Cynicism aside, what this episode also reveals is that PC vendors are good at their job. It’s not their fault if the HCI concept was questionable: they just identified a sales opportunity and went for it.

Sales technique can make a big difference in a crowded and slowing market. HP recently claimed it was winning market share from Dell in the business arena, not by offering better technology or cheaper computers, but by making ordering and delivery less painful. From anecdotal experience, I can believe it.

Last year, I helped out at a startup publishing company whose IT manager tried his best to equip the business using Dell as its sole supplier. Things began badly when the IT manager (with a BBC Home Counties accent) and the India-based Dell salesman could not comprehend each other over the phone. I sympathise with both parties. My wife, also a foreign national, always hands the phone to me if anyone with a Scottish accent calls.

The IT manager resorted to email and fax, but this led to weeks of quotes going back and forth. After a while, he began to doubt his ability to express himself properly, and asked me to help. Sure enough, it became clear that Dell simply didn’t understand our requests, as the hardware specs on each quote were not what we had asked for.

In the end, the IT manager blew his top, obtained a quote from another PC supplier and made the order within days. Driven by deadlines and exasperation, he chose the first alternative supplier to come his way.

Given how easy it is to buy hardware in the low-margin consumer PC market, why is it so difficult to get anywhere when you have a budget of many thousands? If Dell continues like this, it won’t just be HP after its head in 2006.