Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I've been using PUR water pitchers and filters for close to ten years. I have three different pitchers (two small, one large), and each gets used on a daily basis. Obviously, I've used many filters over that ten year period, and during that time occasionally I'd get a filter that would not properly filter water after a few fillings. Less than --guesstimating-- 1% of the filters were 'defective.' However, recently, that is in the last six months, nearly EVERY filter I've used has had this problem. Some straight out of the packaging will not filter a full pitcher of water without taking the filter out of the pitcher and rinsing it repeatedly under water, and then reinserting it into the pitcher. Other filters, like the two I replaced just three days ago, are not filtering properly after only three-four fillings. (And yes, of course--I have always followed the 'conditioning' instructions prior to using the filter.) Some filters--regardless of how many 'rinses' I give them, will not filter a full pitcher of water and I've wound up throwing them away and starting over with a new filter. This has become a very costly procedure. I contacted PUR's customer service and politely explained this situation, asking them for a remedy, or at the very least, I expected a reply. That was over one month ago. I got an auto-response return email saying they'd received my email and would reply. Thereafter, nothing. No a word in response. I'm done. I've got four more 'new' filters that I'll try to use it, as painful as that has become. And today, I will purchasing some Brita pitchers and filters as replacements. I'll be tossing the PUR pitchers in the garbage, because that is where they belong. Update March 16, 2014: After writing this review, I continued to research the problem. Many people have this same problem, and apparently Pur customer service had advised some of those who complained to "whack" the clogged/slow filters up against something hard, like the inside of the kitchen sink, a couple of times. I tried that and it did work on one of the filters. For awhile. It clogged up/slowed down again after maybe five or so fillings. In another review, someone suggested directly spraying water into the two small holes at the bottom of the filter. I tried that too, and it worked for maybe two or three fillings. But it gave me an idea. I took a toothpick, and pushed it into each of those tiny holes, and gently rotated the toothpick before removing it. That appears to work well. I have since tried this procedure on two other filters that were very slow or wouldn't filter the water at all (again, brand new--straight out of the package), and once I do that with the toothpick, the filters work perfectly for the entire time (40 gallons, I keep track of the fillings). I have now found a work-around. I won't upgrade the star rating of these filters, however, because I don't think Pur should make its customers do this much research and spend extra time AND money, simply to make their filters work properly. Furthermore, there are many people who will never figure this out, who will never see this review, or any other review suggesting fixes, and who will simply waste a lot of money on these filters. It's not right.