"Tom G" wrote in
news:rlong.4991$Wl.3581@trnddc01:

The reason a phone number would have been available to you if you had
purchased the protection agreement was that, they then would have
wanted a tech to walk you through the problem to avoid a service call
that would have come out of their pocket. If your machine had been
under the regular warranty, you also would have been handed over to
someone who would have walked you through the codes to again try to
avoid a service call at Sears expense. I'm not saying the above
policy is right or wrong but unless they've changed since I retired,
at least the person you talked to was based in this country and spoke
pretty good English or Spanish (if requested).

I understand that. It's all about the money. And although I believe i
should have been able to speak with a tech support person, my primary
objection is to the fact that they do not provide the error code data
with the purchase of the washer. That's a "gotcha" -- they've made it
virtually impossible for anyone to fix a problem themselves, thus
guaranteeing themselves the service fee. And the washer was purchased
just over a year ago, but it took them three months to properly install
it, so while technically, from the date of purchase, my warranty period
had expired, due to their ineptitude, I'm still within my first year of
actual use.

In any event, times have changed a great deal, I fear. Things didn't
used to be this hard.