Black & Decker - Dewalt Will not honor Warranty Towson Maryland

In October of 2007 (1 year ago) purchased a Black & Decker Hedge Trimmer from Lowes home improvement in North Carolina. In March of this year, during use, the trimmer would not cut. Did a physical check and it looked good but did not cut anything thicker than grass though before that time would cut bushes with no problem.
Called Black & Decker service. Was told I need to bring it to a service center for repair. Explained to the representative I was only in North Carolina for a day. My Father is elderly and ill. Was going to Florida to take care of him. The representive said there was no local service center (closest was three hours away) but if I called when I got down there they would send a label to provide pickup of the trimmer to their service center. They also told me I did not need the receipt because the manufacturing date stamped on the unit itself was:
2006-49-49
This indicated it was built in December (49th week) of 2006 and therefore was under warranty even without receipt until December 2008. The warranty is two years.
When I came to Florida, called back to Black & Decker. Was told they now do not send the labels was first told. I need to contact the service center directly. They said they could not locate the reference number I was given while in North Carolina. I called the service center located upstate (813-884-0434) and spoke to a man who identified himself as the owner/manager. He said being as I did not have a receipt, he would not honor the warranty regardless of the manufacturing date on the unit. He told me I can ship the trimmer to him but I would have to pay the cost to repair or replace and if i did not want it repaired I would have to pay return shipping. When asked about return shipping, he quoted me about $35-40 with handling. North Carolina is too far to travel to locate the store receipt.
Called back to Black & Decker and was told again I need to deal directly with the service center. Asked to speak with a supervisor and was put on hold for over an hour. Finally had to hang up as my Father needed something.
Called back a week later to Black & Decker. Finally spoke with a supervisor who said they would ship out the labels as originally promised and send the trimmer to a different service center in FL who would definitly honor the warranty. He gave me a reference number of 080 623003511
Never received the labels. Called back over a week ago. Was told she did not know why the labels were not sent out. She checked and said it would have to be forwarded to "Austin" for review and would get a call from Black & Decker. The next day I received a call from the first service center who originally said they would not honor the warranty. A woman there said i need to send her the trimmer and then they will decide if the warranty will be covered. Hung up and called Black & Decker again. Again they said it would be forwarded to "Austin" and receive a call back within two days but never received a call again.
Have gone back and forth for six months on this and still no guarantee that if I ship off the unit it will be covered under warranty. This is a total ripoff. Checked with the State of Florida and they said they must honor the warranty as long as the date stamped on the trimmer is within the warranty period. Have bought numerous Black & Decker and Dewalt products in the past but will never purchase another one again. The quality of this trimmer is much less than their products used to be and the warranty seems to be unreliable.

Paul
cape coral, Florida
U.S.A.