I could not disagree with you more. It is legislated for cars. The same problem was occurring. The cars could not be fixed by independent shops or their owners. So the universal OBD codes became mandatory and the car companies have to support the independent shops and car owners. I always carry an OBD scanner in my glove compartment.
Now take boats. The OBD legislation does not apply. It is a nightmare for the independent shops. Each manufacturer has their own codes and scanners. Outlay is thousands of dollars per engine manufacturer. A lot of these engines are in fact car engines made by GM, however no OBD codes which there should be.
Without legislation companies do not treat customers fairly. I can assure you that I have tried to just get a circuit manual out of today's electronics manufacturers and they don't play ball. If that ethic existed when my beautiful vintage equipment was bought, I would not have it now. I absolutely should have a right to obtain a service manual for electronics I purchase, and company support, and so should independent shops.
The independents can't even get that. So we have company warranty service centers, usually across several states. They do warranty work of variable quality. After warranty the customer is usually priced right out of the market.
I'm constantly answering posts here about relatively new equipment failing and having to tell a customer to recycle, because I know darn well the unit can not be fixed at reasonable cost and without a huge hassle.
The only thing wrong with this legislation is that it should be Federal.
France by the way has just passed similar, but more far reaching legislation.
This is something requiring everyone's support. Unfortunately these days, companies seldom to the right thing by their customers unless forced.
One of the problems with this is that the price of a car is far greater than that of a TV, AVR, BD player, etc. While most people don't get their equipment without paying for it, it's not as big of a financial hit when it goes bad after the warranty is over and extended warranties ARE offered & available. Also, people still demand lower prices and with that, comes lower quality for less money because time has allowed the initial investment to be amortized/each successive generation of parts becomes cheaper.
How much can the cost of a given piece of equipment rise to cover the cost of replacement parts and manuals (paper, disc or digital file) before people balk at the purchase price?
Who will be authorized to service the equipment, how will they be trained and who will monitor/administer the warranty program?
How will existing service centers handle the increase in equipment that comes in for repair? A small shop will quickly become inundated and if they need additional techs, the hiring process takes the owners/managers/one man operators off of the bench.
What is an acceptable turn-around time if the parts are in stock or can be received quickly? One week? Two weeks? What if the parts are back-ordered (whether real, or artificially)? Should the re-seller be required to provide a temporary replacement? The manufacturer? That usually didn't happen before, but people use the AVR/receiver as the hub for their whole system and that can cover the whole house, unlike the past, when people had a small system in each area.
Don't expect the re-sellers to be in favor of being required to provide a backup piece- many of us don't stock inventory because:
It ties up a lot of money,
Floor-planning costs a lot of money,
Electronics distributors won't want to stock more to provide loaners
It takes time to remove and reinstall a temporary unit and repeat this when the other has been repaired and if our schedule is full, this will cause delays,
Manufacturers don't pay us to support their equipment now, I seriously doubt they'll start at this point without the expense causing other problems.
I know Wisconsin had an organization for electronic servicers- Minnesota may have one, too.
I absolutely agree that the manufacturers are wrong to make their equipment un-serviceable, but the sad fact is that this stuff is a commodity. The scale of the industry and the complexity of the equipment have grown so much that the cost to implement this would be substantial and if one agency is tasked with its administration, I don't see it gong well. NARDA used to be the organization that oversaw it before and it tended to work pretty well, but warranty labor rates rarely met the shop rate.
I think you might also send this letter to the FTC.