>>1046255>What'd Berkely do?Bought a couple AMP rods on sale ($1.00 with select reel purchases at Dick's) when they first came out. Super wispy, sensitive, light rods.
Love'em until less than three months in line starts snapping randomly; start of a cast, lure in mid air, mid retrieve, when sizeable fish are on the line. Lots of lost lures and frustration.
After replacing line, taking apart and reassembling reels, etc finally figure out soft, inferior guide inserts are to blame. The tip guides look like when you make an OK sign with your first finger and thumb. Lots of deep grooves cut into the guide just from using plain old Trilene mono (as recommended, betting braid would've cut the guide in half in under a month's time). Signs of grooves/guide wear all the way down to the lowest guides.
Phone Berkley, said they'd no similar reports and to contact their service department via email, said I'd likely have to destroy the current rods in order for replacements to be shipped.
Compose email to Berkley relaying all of the above, stating I'd be happy to pay the other $58 (the difference if they'd not been bought on sale) for two new rods and the assurance they wouldn't fail the same way, explain if they couldn't I'd rather not snap the two perfectly good rod blanks I had - that if I were to destroy them I'd prefer it be in process of trying to replace the guides myself. Yadda yadda blah blah, attached photos of failing guides, completely polite throughout the email, a bit long winded perhaps but thorough.
Receive a single paragraph email directing me back to the 800 number with a code for a "one-time courtesy discount" I'd been approved for.
I never called. Their response didn't address a single concern, they'd clearly ignored that I wasn't after a discount (and was willing to pay more for a product that wouldn't fail the same way), so I chalked my attempts as falling on deaf ears/blind eyes. Wrote'em off right there.
