Service Contracts for AC units

[Tim Healey]

Hi All, I had a blower motor on a 1 year old AC unit go out on Friday evening last week. Ignoring the obviously crappy quality of the product, I had some quite alarming (and not unfamiliar) conversations with AC repair companies. Basically, the part ($250.00 worth) is covered under warranty, but you're on your own for the $90.00 call out fee and then $420.00 installation fee. While I find this outrageous (imagine if Toyota or Mercedes handled warranty maintenance like that), I wanted to ask if anyone has any experience with getting on a service contract which may avoid some of the call out fees etc. 

I now have 6 AC units, so it seems likely that something will break at least on a yearly basis so I may get some value out of the reduced service costs. I realize it's a mathematical issue that is really a function of the cost of the contract vs the cost of doing maintenance out of contract, but I was wondering if anyone else had looked into this and what conclusion you may have come to?

Thanks All

Tim.