Yes, we've done it quite a few times, if you're talking about infomercials. Those companies spend a fortune to buy that air time. (Many cable systems actually survive on that income, not our paltry fifty bucks a month.) There's no way they're going to risk getting the slightest reputation for dishonorability in order to screw someone out of a few hundred dollars. They make millions.
QVC, Home Shopping, in particular, are scrupulous to a fault. In many cases they pay for shipping the product back. They ask no questions except, "Is something wrong with it," so they'll know not to toss it back into inventory and sell the same defective product to somebody else.
We bought one of those "Total Fitness Gyms" that Chuck Norris sells. It is truly wonderful, no matter how many of your body parts might be broken or hurting, you can find a healthy way to exercise the other ones. Anyway, after three years the little foot rest that slides on the bottom started to come apart. One of the welds wasn't holding. With great trepidation we called the company, expecting to be treated like dirt, like happens at Circuit City. Instead, they sent us a whole brand new machine, not just the broken part. And they didn't even want us to send the old one back! We bartered it to our auto mechanic for some car repairs. He's got a welder and he fixed it right up. It's ugly now but it works.
None of those merchants want to risk getting kicked off of TV. It's such a good ride for them, they can afford to satisfy every dissatisifed customer. It just helps their reputation. Look at me telling you how great they are, and all it cost them was a few hundred dollars.
The worst story I heard was some lady on Oprah who had what I call "bulemia plastica." She couldn't stop herself from buying stuff on HSC, but she couldn't afford it all so she sent almost all of it back for a refund. They never turned her down. However, after about a year of this, the next time she called in they told her that she was now on their "do not sell anything to this lady" list.
