After much going back and forth, SquareTrade is upholding their end of the warranty. I have submitted receipts for the purchase of the fan online ($23.99-free shipping) and the installation work at Best Buy ($52.48 with tax) and SquareTrade is reimbursing me.

If you have a warranty with this company and want to keep your computer and just have work done, please follow up with a live person to see if you can have the work done locally. In my case, even if it had cost $150 to repair my machine, the warranty would have covered $142.50 (the purchase price of my unit on eBay) of the work and I would only have been out $7.50 and had a working machine. The power of persistence and the threat of interwebz exposure prevail!!

[Ha! Just got the call from the Geek Squad and the machine is ready to pick up! Less than 24 hours later, no freight train noises from the fan!!]