MacBook Air 2018 Retina

I bought my MacBook Air 2018 retina in May 2018. Shortly after Christmas this year, the keyboard stopped working. It won't respond to any commands and the backlight doesn't work. I have to use a USB keyboard to type. The power, touch ID and keypad all work normally. I took it to Apple in-store shortly after Christmas. They checked it out and the guy said it could be a number of things from needing a different part to a wire being broken somewhere etc... but basically said it would potentially hundreds of pounds (GBP) to fix it and it had little market value being a 5-year-old product. I was disheartened but left it at that and thought maybe buy a new one at a later stage. I was recently shown an article saying Apple is doing free repairs on keyboards and mine was on the list. I contacted Apple via the online chat tonight. The agent gave me tips but basically said my product doesn't qualify for the scheme. She did advise me to go to an Apple Store and basically see if they'll take pity on me and do it. I view this as a waste of time as surely if it qualified they would have said when I was last there.

Other than buying a new one, or going to Apple to basically beg a staff member to fix it, has anyone any advice on the matter? Have you had similar issues but fixed them at home?