Powerblock Inc

Mr*** first contacted us on 10/via email requesting a new part for his set of PowerBlock selectorized dumbbells. On 10/his email was responded to and he was informed that the cost for the part in question would be $30. Mr *** then expressed his dissatisfaction through
multiple emails which were responded to the following day. It was pointed out to him that the warranty card that was included with his purchased set clearly states that our warranty is in fact a limited warranty and that the part in question, the selector pin, was not covered under the limited lifetime warranty.That said, a new pin was sent out to Mr*** at no charge on 10/6, well before this complaint was brought to our attention. As for the disputed $30, we cannot support that claim since there was no charge for the replacement part that was sent.If you do have any further questions or require any additional documentation, please feel free to contact me, Dan ***, at ###-###-####, or via email, ***@powerblock.com

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 12, 2015/07/17) */
Contact Name and Title: Dan [redacted], CS Mgr
Contact Phone: [redacted]
Contact Email: [redacted]@powerblock.com
Unfortunately we are simply not able to support every item we've ever manufactured indefinitely. From time to time changes are needed...

in order to keep the product and the industry fresh and relevant. The set in question is the Elite Set (or Classic 90) and if purchased at 50lbs is expandable to a heavier weight making the system Expandable. There is no information on our sight or in any published material that states that we will never discontinue any item and must therefor honor any request for said item.
With the customers claim that we refused to help him, we no longer have any of the item in stock and do not have any parts to build the item in question. We simply do not have the product or the means to produce the product for the customer. The issue isn't a matter of PowerBlock not wanting to help, we are just not able to do so.
As for exchanging the product, PowerBlock will honor any return or exchange within 30 days. This set was purchased well before the 30 day window and cannot offer an exchange or return beyond that period. Since the set was not initially purchased from us, we do not funds with which to refund the customer even if we did offer an extended return policy.
As for the statement of making the customer feel "silly or stupid", we do not record any of our phone conversations so I would not be able to give a specific response if this was made over the phone. As for any emails we exchanged, I can provide the most recent exchange we have on file. It reads:
"[redacted],
Unfortunately there is not a lot I can do. I wish we were able to warn our customers in advanced, but I wasn't given any notice before we discontinued the kit. I am very sorry for the inconvenience. Please let me know if you have any further questions or if I can help with anything else.
Sincerely,
Cassie [redacted], PowerBlock Customer Service"
If this email was taken as a belittlement to the customer, it was entirely inadvertent.
As for a resolution, we are unable to offer a full refund on the current set. If the set is sent back to us, we may be able to offer a partial refund but it would not be possible to guarantee this without inspecting the set in question. We do have a few of our newest models that arrived from our factory with minor blemishes. We could easily provide one of these sets at a discounted price.
Please feel free to contact me if you have any further questions or concerns.
Dan [redacted]
PowerBlock Customer Service Manager
[redacted]
Initial Consumer Rebuttal /* (3000, 14, 2015/07/20) */
(The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)
I obviously didn't derive any feelings of being belittled by a generic customer service email. It was fine. As I said the customer service issues I encountered were within a phone call of which there is no record. That's also fine.
I do, however, find it difficult to justify shipping 180 lbs worth of dumbbells at my cost for an undisclosed, and possibly nonexistent, partial refund. I also doubt that I will contact the company in regards to discounted factory damaged goods.
And you're right, your literature doesn't contain any information about always carrying a certain product, but had I been lucky enough to purchase any of the larger expansions or accessories how did your company plan to replace any of them under a lifetime warranty if you discontinue the hardware?
Surely you wouldn't replace dumbbells, expansions, and accessories with updated models if only one component had broken.
Final Business Response /* (4000, 16, 2015/07/31) */
After doing a bit more research on the issue, We are not able to find the original transaction information for [redacted]. If we never filled an order for [redacted], it is simply not possible for us to offer any type of refund. I apologize for the confusion and requesting further information, but if the order was not placed with us, there is nothing we can do.
Originally, we did offer a partial refund in an earlier response under the impression that the set was purchased from us. This is strictly against company policy and general business practice, but since We have already made this promise under a different understanding, we will be willing to "buy back" the set in question. This is all that we can offer since the product does not appear to have been purchased from us.
We would also like to address the issue of "Lifetime Warranty" the set in question does not have a lifetime warranty and does not state on our website or any other website that it would have a lifetime warranty. Also, the warranty for all of our products state that we will repair any damaged set that is found to be a manufacture defect.
I realize that this is not the desired solution, and I wish that we had a better alternative, but we simply cannot refund a product that was purchased from a different company.