I worked at Office Depot in Seattle for almost two years as a technology salesman. I know the system very well, and I can, with complete honesty, say that our store managers and the employees who sold the plans cared very much about the customers.
Yes, the employees and managers make a profit and bonuses (both) from selling them. And perhaps the plans are a bit more expensive than they should be.
But ya know what? If a customer ever came back to the store, complaining about a product that they had purchased that broke, for WHATEVER reason, we would ALWAYS take care of them if they had purchased a plan, even if they were still under the manufacturer's warranty. You can hate on OD all you want, and there very well may be "evil" stores out there who are just out to screw customers, but my experience was very different.
Our store had frequent repeat customers, because we would simply ask them if they wanted the plan. If they said no, we let it be. If they were hesitant, we would explain exactly what it would do for them. Because of this straightforward, honest, approach, people liked us and we always sold more plans than most other stores in the whole company.
So, again, it sucks that there are these bad policies put in place by certain stores, but you should know that not all stores take this approach, even if it is demanded by upper management. Having the customer's trust always brought more business.