Hello everybody unfortunately I found this site too late and went ahead and had my Toyota dealership fix the problem. I ended up paying over $900.
I asked for the old AC Panel back and when I inspected it, the problem was exactly as described here with the knob getting loose and the 3 wires detaching. This was a simple solder fix so why does Toyota have to replace the whole unit? I feel like such a chump and I am just wondering if I should just let this go as a very expensive lesson. Any advise from here will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Norman