In this satirical BOFH episode, the narrator and his assistant attempt to reclaim small expenses from petty cash, only to be challenged by an unusually strict junior accountant. Their dispute centres on whether several £4.99 receipts for USB drives meet reimbursement rules, illustrating the comic frustration of bureaucratic processes applied to minor workplace purchases.

The accountant argues that the receipts lack sufficient detail and that the purchases should have gone through the organisation’s procurement system, despite the drives being urgently needed for the boss’s replacement laptop. To secure the required authorisation, the pair engineer an incident involving the boss’s laptop that draws him into the office, allowing them to obtain his signature on the expense forms.