LauraStar steam iron reliability?

My wife bought a Laurastar model 725 in October 2006 that worked great for about 2 years. Sent it to NYC to be repaired. Came back with a tag that indicated the thermostat and fuse had been replaced. It has been not working again for about 6 months. So this is two failures in 4 years of use. If I assume that my wife used it for an hour each day (very unlikely) that is an average of approximately 730 hours usage between failures.This is very poor reliability for such an expensive home appliance. What is the reliability experience for others who have purchased this appliance?