EPSON had deployed a 'Smart Chip' technology on their ink jet printers for years. On their cartridges a small chip will monitor the consumption of the ink each time you print something and deduct that amount from the cartridge capacity and report the remaining amount of ink to the printer. If this value drops below a threashold, the printer will refuse to print even if you still have some ink in the cartridge or you've just refilled it.
EPSON claims this technology is to improve the image quality and report remaing ink amount accurately, but as you can see the whole purpose of this is to defeat 3rd party cartridges (this had been cracked) and ink refill.
You may need to invest some money (about $15) on a thing called 'Smart Cartridge Chip Resetter' to reset the chip each time you refill. Check your printer model to see if it has 'Smart Chip' technology. Another suggestion is, given the fact that printers are sooooooo cheap these days, ditch the *****.