"said Bill Gates, Ping's director of distribution and associate general counsel."
You can't make that stuff up...
Good for these guys (the shop owners), F Ping, and F the Narc who notified Ping.
I suspect customers had to send in receipts when requesting some kind of warranty coverage. If they've decided to check those receipts against their pricing policy, the discounts would become obvious without someone being a narc.
However, I agree with the sentiment.