Philips Sonicare's deceptive warranty policies

I owned an old Sonicare for many years. It was a great product.

After five years, I purchased a new one. This was after Philips bought the company. It failed in a year. They replaced it. The replacement has now failed a few months later. They refuse to replace it again.

What's interesting is that I had inadvertently called the professional customer service line (for dentists and the like) a few minutes before that call. There I was told the replacement model they sent me had a known history of failures and they would replace it with an improved version. We started to get the replacement information and he found out I was a retail customer. He said he couldn't do it and gave me a different number where, he said, they would take care of it. A that line (retail customer service) they told me that there was no problem with the unit and they would not replace it. This despite the fact that it was only nine months old and had a documented history of failures. When I told them what I had been told by the other guy, the response was that he was wrong, that no one at Philips would ever say that.

Clearly, there is one company line for dentists who shill these things and get freebies for their staffs, and another company line for consumers who actually buy them.