Former printer tech here - waste ink pads are common in inkjets, and definitely not an issue exclusive to Epson. After all, the ink that it sucks through priming on start up/shut down/idle has to go somewhere.

It's not that straightforward to modify the machine to make the parts user replaceable. I know in Canon inkjets, at least, this was my least favourite job - the entire printer has to be disassembled from the top-down (including a number of springs and the decoder strip) to get to the pads. Most of the cost is in labour, not the parts.