They sure do. And, when posted on a forum such as this one bad press is way worse than 100 good ones.
Abu Garcia treated me the same as Vortex except way before electronic communication. I broke an open-faced reel. Tried to fix it myself. After looking at the parts for years, I mailed them with a note explaining the situation and asking them to fix it if less than $20 otherwise pitch it. They sent me a new reel at no charge!