A 'lifetime guarantee', is spending lots of years with an old bloke like Growster..;0)
Apart from that awful comment, we had a problem with Ebay on a similar case. The supplier was absolutely useless and refused to compromise, so apart from a credit report on the seller to the original manufacturers, we were powerless, and wrote it all off as a bad debt. Life's too short, and we weighed it against the better deals we'd had; they usually balance out.
A replacement is better than a kick - er - there, but today's shopping experiences have to be checked against our own eyes for either a bargain, or a fiddle...
But, if I knew Goosey was on the phone to complain, I'd immediately try and get a job in Outer Mongolia - by lunchtime..;0)