I sent this email to a manufacturer:
Gentleman,
What difference does it make who owns the unit, the original purchaser or a second owner? If you offer a warranty on your product you should honour any repairs needed within the warranty period regardless of who owns it at the time it requires service. Generally speaking quality products shouldn't need any repairs, I have plenty of components that have never required any warantee work. It's not a perfect world and unexpected failures do happen; I've had the misfortune of some of my components needing service either marginally out of warranty or, within warranty but I'm the second (or third) owner. In every case I've never been charged for the repair (although I may have to pay shipping to/from the manufacturer, fair enough). I consider that good customer service, so does other manufacturers you compete with. If I was refused warranty repair within the warranty period because I was not the original owner you can bet I would make sure the high end community knew about it, the !
'net is a powerful communication medium. The "dealer protection" angle you choose to advertise is unacceptable. I wouldn't ask a dealer to be involved in a warranty repair unless I bought it from them, I'm quite happy to absorb the shipping costs as required. Why write? I like to see good companies thrive, you're not doing yourself any favours. Best, Jeff