[Steve]

My take on this would probably to pursue the legal route. I don't know the law for NZ but I would have thought that if you where quoted 300 and agreed to a repair on that basis then Pentax attempting to charge anything more would be illegal. In that case any amount over the quoted 300 I would contest on those grounds alone.

The rest of the story is unfortunate but not really relevant in as much as irrespective of the cause, if the cost of repair was 300 (which you agreed to) then I assume you would have been happy to pay that and have your camera back in fully working order?

At 400, depending on prices or replacement in NZ it may be close to tipping the balance on your replacing the (2 year old) camera with a newer model to get benefit of new technology and the improvements that brings.

What is the law in NZ ref quotes for repairs, have you checked into that?