I remember decades ago working for Security Express based at Essendon with their Aero Commanders. GAM did the maintenance in those days. One aircraft I flew was notorious for its ADF which had a range of only five miles. The other pilots that flew that aircaft accepted the crook ADF as a fact of GA life and never wrote up the snag. I snagged it in the maintenance release which aroused the ire of the owner for dirtying his otherwise spotless maintenance release. . An LAME then signed it off as serviceable. I flew it next day - same range problem just 5 miles. I wrote it up again.
This time I saw the same LAME.. He said the owner had told him to write it up as ground tested serviceable and he would get the LAME to fix it at the next 100 hourly to save maintenance costs. The next 100 hourly was 80 flight hours ahead and so that Aero Commander kept flying for the next few weeks racking up the hours to the next 100 hourly still with a crook ADF with its 5 mile range.