John,
It's not the triviality of the door mod, it's what relation does that mod have to with the replacement of a small box in the panel with another almost identical small box?
And the need for an aeronautical engineer to give me a bunch of paper work (the cost of which was a little over DOUBLE what it cost me for the guy with the soldering iron to actually put it in there!) that doesn't tell me, or anyone else operating the aircraft, something that they already know?
I suspect that you would be in the minority that feel the fee should reflect the work involved, as I have been quoted from $660 to $1500 for JUST the EO for a transponder. And in ALL cases, the place issuing it, won't have looked at the aircraft. It cost me 3 hours labour to have the actual unit fitted.
It's cost like these, which can be anywhere from 2-5 hours of equivalent flight revenue, is killing GA, and they don't do ANYTHING.
If you can draw the direct link to safety for these, I am only to happy to see it, but from my point of view, it's just a way to bleed owners a little further.