We remember Huffy for their bikes. Those first, off-the-rack bikes given by a grandfather hefting one down from the K-mart rack. He puts it down and says, take this for a ride and see how it does you, sport. Eagerly we climbed on, not knowing of course at that tender age that we would later mock the very transportation device for its middling charm, simplicity and inability to traverse mud splattered boulders.

However, we never tried out their basketball hoops. Curtis did, it broke and he had a devil of a time getting it fixed.

By devil we mean a powerful, supernatural force that can be harnessed for good. Curtis writes:

Dear Consumerist,

In early April the Plexiglas on the backboard of our Huffy basketball hoop broke much to the dismay of my two sons. I knew I didn’t have my receipt, proof of purchase, warranty card…whatever…but I decided to charge head first and unarmed into a customer service battle.

More, after the jump…

Curtis continues:

“I found out via their website that the backboard has a three year warranty, ours is only about 1.5 years old. After a bit more digging I found that to submit a claim I had to email photos of the damage to their CS. Clever, suck me in with a seemingly easy task and then crush me under the weight of warranty claim requirements. But I sent the photos and after 3 days of silence I had almost given up when I received my reply.

“Sorry to hear about the damage to your backboard. We will be happy to replace it. Please send us your shipping address and a phone number in case the shipping company needs to contact you.”

Wha? Where’s the fierce resistance?…the snippy retorts? Where’s the hook? Waaait a minute, its probably just a piece a blank Plexiglas sent with some arcane assembly instructions and it’ll take 6 months to get here…right? I emailed my contact info along with a few follow up questions. I got a reply the same day:

“Thank you for your shipping information and contact info.

Unfortunately [ah THERE it is…I thought], we do not make your exact model backboard any longer but the replacement is the same size and will not require any modification and will be completely assembled and ready to install.

Your replacement is slightly backordered [AHA!!!] but we expect it to ship on or about May 15th and will take 7-10 days to arrive.”

At this point I was completely deflated. I had charged in ready to wage battle only to find a nice lady with flowers in her hand…for me. The only thorn in all of this was that the replacement would take 1.5 months to get to me. But who am I to complain…its free.

And to cap things off? The backboard arrived on May 10, far in advance of their estimate. It worked perfect and my kids and I appreciate it.

Well done Huffy!”

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