The right thing, BTW, is using your clout with the vendor and having a system in place to either continue to repair the problem, or get a reasonable discount on a new machine for the customer.
I tried to bring this up in a work place once.
The boss gave me a dirty look and said, "we aren't set up that way."
As long as management doesn't view the customer as their most valuable asset, the customer will feel like the one left out when their date took someone else home.
For years it was my practice to avoid Best Buy because of the super loud music. Maybe this appealed to the young crowd. It hurt my head. Then someone told me they stopped playing the loud music. Then I tended to avoid them because no one knew anything and it took forever to buy something even if you new exactly what you wanted.
jtk
"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
- Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)