I'm hard on my equipment, dragging it up and down mountains and all, so it isn't unusual for me to need repairs. So I thought I'd update you on a few experiences I've had recently.
First, the non-Nikon one. My Ricoh GX-100 took a blow to the LCD, rendering it still operable since I have optical finders for it but mostly useless (too much of the UI on current cameras require the LCD to be operative; that's true of DSLRs as well as compacts). Repair bill: US$185. That's actually better than I would have expected. An LCD replacement is major surgery with a high-priced part. If you're a G9 user, take a look at Really Right Stuff's clever L-plate and protector. It's a bit heavy and over-engineered, but it would have protected my G9 from the fate of my GX-100 in the same situation. Too bad I can't convince RRS to make a similar solution for other compacts.
Meanwhile, my 70-300mm started having ocassional fits of VR shivers on my last trip. That triggered a B2 level replacement of the VR system by NikonUSA, and since I'd sent that four-year warranty extension card in, it was done for free. Note that the lens still worked, but what would happen is that I'd sometimes have VR outages and sometimes overeager VR, and it wasn't predictable. I wasn't 100% sure that there was a real issue with the lens (it could have been contact issues or something else), but Nikon found the problem immediately when they put it on the test rig.
My 70-180mm has put on more miles than most of you have on your frequent flyer programs. Somewhere in the last year I managed to put a small scratch on the front glass. Didn't seem to impact the results, though it mocked and annoyed me every time I cleaned the lens. The zoom and focus rings were starting to get a little "gritty" so I decided to send it into NikonUSA, too. That was a C-level repair (replace the front element) and wound up costing me US$270.
NikonUSA has gotten better at handling repairs (either that or they're trying to get on my good side ;~). Both lenses arrived at NikonUSA on a Friday (based upon email notification from FedEx), and I had email estimates back from Nikon when I got to the computer on Monday morning. And their Web site was accurate and up-to-date when I checked it on Monday. Curiously, NikonUSA still seems to ship stuff back to you before they update their Web pages, though. When UPS came with the repaired lenses the Web site still listed them as being worked on at Nikon.
I should point out that I've heard from a lot of other Nikon users since I last updated my Nikon Repair article. It does seem that NikonUSA has improved many of the aspects that I originally complained about. I'll be doing a bit more research on that before I rewrite that article, so if you have any NikonUSA repair experience in the last year, I'd like to hear about it.