Pond Country

We are sorry that you are unhappy with your recent experience at Pond Country regarding the pump you brought in. Unfortunately, if a product (such as what happened with your pump) works when we test it, there is nothing we can do as far as replacing it. The warranty is guaranteed by the manufacturing company from whom we purchased the pump, and if we return it for warranty and it works for them also, they will not send a replacement. This is the way business works when warranties past the purchase date are involved as the manufacturer, not the retailer, processes the return. Our records indicate that your purchase of a small 30 gallon patio pond, 90 GPH pump and a spitter occurred approximately one year ago. We would like to share some information with you regarding the 90 GPH pump: these pumps either work or they don’t work – they do not turn themselves on and off at will. If water was not coming out of the spitter, it is likely the intake to the pump had some debris around it which caused the pump to not be able to push the water up into the spitter. If occasionally the debris shifted, then the pump would be able to push the water up into the spitter again, making it seem like the pump was working intermittently. This is a common occurrence in our own smaller display patio ponds. This pump size is very sensitive to any debris buildup, even if only a few strands of string algae or a small bit of leaf litter gets sucked up against the intake. When the rocks in your small patio pond were removed to get the pump out, it may be that this activity shifted some debris that had been caught up against the pump intake so that when we plugged it in at the store, it worked fine. These small pumps need to be cleaned about once/month to keep them going consistently. This doesn’t mean you have to remove the pump to clean it – you can simply turn off the power, take a small brush and brush the intake area gently to remove any debris that may have become stuck on it. Another possible option is to put some filtration around the pump that would keep debris from reaching the pump intake. We have a product which does exactly this, called a Matala Pump Defender. This is actually a piece of filtration material which has been formed into a basket. As the pump pulls water into its intake, the water comes through the filter material first and debris gets stopped on the outside of the filter and never makes it to the pump. We hope this information has been helpful!