Why did you order it if you didnt agree with that policy? They warn you on the product page with giant red lettering. Did you not understand it? Or that it is not a consumer product?
If you stuck to "didn't you agree with that policy" perspective, you'd never get in a car, on a plane, or buy anything.
What is a lot harder, and needs additional information about the motivation, is why somebody would consciously engage into this interaction and then demand it to be a different format. Because then it becomes a task of filtering out motivated people.
If i personally send you a prototype at cost and you demand it to be treated like a normal customer interaction the result will be that i wont be sending out prototypes at cost to just anyone any longer. Thats quite the bummer for people who wanted one.
So the question is how can we connect group A (manufacturer) and B(eager testers) without group C(Consumers) getting caught in the whole thing?
edit: Not saying what Pine is doing is good or bad, but the core problem isnt specific to Pine and many tinkerers might end up in this situation one day. And charging above cost is extremely counterproductive in some situations because it locks out some developers.
If you genuinely want people to be prototype/beta testers, give them the phone for free and then ask for it back at the end of the beta period. But the transaction occurring here is, fundamentally, a consumer transaction no matter what Pine wants to call it, and that comes with certain responsibilities which cannot be disclaimed, period.
I confused why somebody would claim them despite knowing that the only reason they can get a device in the first place is because they are ordering something that is not meant to be ordered by consumers. They arent priced in. You used a mechanism and involved yourself into an interaction you werent supposed to be in. Because the fix for the problem at hand is no longer allowing just anyone to get a devkit. Because the whole point is to get the device to developers as cheap as possible.
edit: Or differently put, the problem here isnt that OP got damaged hardware but that he ended up in an interaction he wasnt supposed to be in. And keeping people from accidentally ending up in there is one problem you can work on, but what motivates people to do this consciously?