Thank you so much for posting this warning. My service agreement on my Bernina 440QE expires in March. I can renew it for another 3 years for about $260. With the service agreement, I can take the machine in as often as I want for checkup and cleaning, and if anything goes wrong it will be fixed, free of charges for parts and labor. DH tried to tell me that I didn't need the service agreement anymore, since nothing has gone wrong so far - but now I'm convinced that I do need it.