Mine did the same thing. There were no broken tabs on the door panel, but the tabs on the switch panel had worn slots in the composite board of the door panel allowing the switch panel to pop out.

One side is secured by four little tabs as described above, the other side is secured by two spring clips. You can see the tabs along the left in my picture. The two spring clips are barely visible on the right. There are no "posts" on the door panel for clips or tabs to attach to. The tabs secure one side by reaching behind the panel. The spring clips press on the other side of the opening to wedge the switch panel in place. I added the metal strip because the four tabs actually wore grooves in the composite door panel leaving nothing to secure to.

I repaired my door panel by reinforcing the grooved areas by epoxying a thin metal strip to the back of the door panel, thus restoring the damage.

For a metal strip I cut up a metal strip from Home Depot that was originally designed to be used to secure floor joists to each other...

You can see my 'fix' in the attached picture. You can see the tabs on the left and the spring clips on the right. My example is for the driver's (LH) door and has held up extremely well.

The procedure to remove the door panel is posted elsewhere on this site.

Attached Thumbnails

 

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