Repair shops don't like being dumped on.
If you send/take your radio to a decent shop and they know it hasn't been powered-up (they do the typical caps, cleaning and etc.) and it fails on power-up in a bad way, the repair person would quickly power down and start looking for clues (smell, heat, discoloration). Turn-around is normal and repair cost typical.
If you take the radio as it is and power it up yourself, if it fails and is taken to a repair shop, you have robbed the repair person of the clues (and first hand experience) they needed to locate the source of the problem. Troubleshooting takes longer and the repair cost goes up.
If a novice replaces the caps, it fails and the radio is taken to a repair shop (they can see the recent cap job), the repair cost would most likely be even higher. Your radio also may be assigned a lower priority and may sit on the shelf for a good while till other repair jobs are finished.
I fully appreciate your points. I'll take the radio, untouched, to whichever repair shop I go with.
