Rob,
We have now received back your faulty dock and I have looked at it personally. My conclusion is that the problem is in the battery pack. I believe that ther is an intermittent connection between the cells. I placed the pack into my demo Pronto, dropped it in the charger, and the charger clearly is passing voltage as the Pronto comes on in the charger. When I lifted it out of the charger it was dead to the world. I then laid it face down on the table and a few seconds later, it beeped (turned on). I then put a slight pressure on the top of the battery pack and it again went dead.
Conclusion: Bad battery pack.
We will get you a complete new dock as soon as we receive them from Philips. Sorry for the trouble. I guess the battery was assembled on a friday. FYI It comes out a French Philips facility. I am also checking into alternative sources and replacement battery packs.