Audiologist to support hearing aid bought on line

Question and Answer
#10

I felt like you, but finally gave in and bought a Siemens pure 300 from my audiologist. I had free batteries for two years, and a two year warranty. They did all of that for me. I didn’t have to worry with it. My walk in visits for adjustments, cleaning, etc were free, and I have been in there a lot. IN fact, I have had to send the Siemens Pure 300 off for repair twice during the first 18 months to be repaired under the warranty. A lot of my problems with it not working well were due to the fact that I sweat a lot and moisture got in it. If you have any kind of problems at all, there is no substitute for having a face to face visit with a competent professional to help you figure out the problem and work with the company to get it resolved. Unfortunately, my Siemens 300 quit working one time too many just as I was getting ready to buy a Siemens 301 for my right ear and a MiniTek device to pair it via bluetooth with my cell phone.

My audiologist let me try out the 300 and the 301 together for about a week. They worked great together, but when I went in to buy it, the 300 would not pair with the MiniTek and I asked about getting some kind of deal to replace the 300 with a 301 and was told that Siemens does not do that. I had two choices: Send the 300 in for repair or pay full price to upgrade my old 300 to the 301. I really have not been happy with all the problems with the 300, so I decided to “cut Siemens loose”, spend twice as much money for a better aid, and hope that Phonak is a company with better customer support than Siemens. For $5100 I am purchasing two Phonak Solana MicroP aids and an ICom from my audiologist. Im a little chapped with Siemens, but that’s ok. I understand the 301 is a totally different aid, but it sure looks the same. Siemens didn’t want to give any kind of discount to upgrade my old 300 which was a “hearing aid lemon”. This will be the third time sending the 300 back to the factory as I have six months remaining on the warranty. I will keep the repaired (but for how long?) 300 as a “back up” hearing aid. When the thing works, it’s great. But this time, I’m paying a lot more for what I hope are better aides (this time 2 aids like my audiologist reccommended) from a company I hope will have better customer and audiologist support. With Phonak I will have a three year warranty, and five years of free batteries. And this time I am going to purchase a $25 eargear waterproof sleeve in an effort to head off any moisture problems.

Get the best aid you can afford, but don’t skimp on service. It’s not as simple as putting in the battery and sticking the aid in the ear – you will most likely need more than one adjustment. And, thank God, audiologists are generally very patient people. Just be sure to rob a different bank each time (only kidding).

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#11

Thankyou once more to everyone responding to my queries re on-line hearing aids. The Costco idea sounds worth an investigation and thanks to Prodigy place for his suggestion. As for Beldanjo. I’m confused by the whole business and felt O.K. I’ll follow the suggestion of my audiologist and go with the Pure 301, only to hear about problems. It’s all beginning to sound too much trouble and I’m ready to retreat into a quiet world. Someone please convince me!

#12

There is definitely a learning curve with starting up with hearing aids. To me, and I bet many would agree, the single most important part of it is finding a professional you trust and like. The professional is the one who will adjust the aids, probably many times, so it’s important to be able to talk to the person.

As far as the different models go, it is a little like buying a car and going to the dealer for advice. Of course their model is best but any of the top models will get you there, although some may be more suited to you than others.

Re-read what ZCT said about doing the tests and setup live, with the hearing aid in the ear.

It is certainly worth it, even life changing, to get hearing aids so don’t give up. My advice is to find a local person you like and trust and see what they recommend.

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#13

Surely there can be a balance. If the client is paying for the service and the time, why refuse? You’d be shooting yourself in the foot possibly loosing a future HA buyer if you do a good job fitting them. Your comments reinforce the general view that you guys are plainly salesmen and not health professionals. I pay 75$ when I visit my doctors’s office(or more if it is a long appt.), they don’t have to sell me anything to make a living

#14

I ultimately decided to live with imperfect hearing. I lead a happy, healthy life and I can still hear birdsong and the wind in the trees and the wonder of the waves. Many of my favourite activities like swimming and walking in the rain would exclude hearing aids anyway and I’ll just have to go early to get a front seat at poetry readings and learn to lip read. Keep it simple. :):slight_smile:

#15

If you have significant hearing loss I can’t help but believe you would be better off with hearing aids than without. Yes, there are a lot of different opinions here about what to do, what to buy, and how to buy. Yes, it is a big purchase and there are risks no matter which way you go, but the answer is not to do nothing. The answer is, there are several good choices and any of them could have some problems but, most likely, any of the top choices will work out fine.

I get up every morning, get a shower, brush off any dried ear wax from my receivers, and pop them in. The rest of the day I don’t say “huh”, “what was that”, etc. I don’t have to avoid situations with difficult hearing environments, I don’t avoid groups, and I miss very little. Now that’s simple. It is MUCH less stressful to wear hearing aids than to need them and not have them.

#16

I read the Starkey internet sales policy. One internet retailer specifically mentioned is Hearing Planet. I am not sure exactly how Hearing Planet works, but I do know they require you to go to a local audiologist so I am not sure of why Starkey is objecting other than to try to enforce the local pricing policies. If you buy from Hearing Planet are you buying from them or from the local audiologist who then pays Hearing Planet a “finder”/referral fee?

#17

who were extremely helpful and patient with my enquiries and much pleasanter to deal with than the testing audiologist

but will they still blow in your ear after they have your money?

#18

There are Audiologists (like myself) who will charge a fee for service (office visit) for programming hearing aids not purchased from my office. However, before I will even touch the aids,I call the manufacturer to verify the validity of the aids. Many aids purchased online are counterfeits, and believe me, you CANNOT tell the difference between real and not.

So many Audiologists refuse to touch them based on this reason aside from the financial reason. And true, you may pay for an office visit at your physician’s office, but they are also billing your insurance for things. And many insurances do not cover hearing aids. Many physicians don’t fit durable medical equipment, they are selling you their services. If you don’t believe me, ask your physician what their annual marketing budget is - you won’t find one in any sizeable city in the US that will say they don’t have one.

Now if you’ll excuse me - I have a sales meeting to go to :wink:

dr.amy

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#19

I did phone a few audiologists before i found those who do it. It’s not cheap, one programming cost me 140$, one of the audiologist asked for 230$ for 3 visits, finally I chose my old audiologist (I bought from him one hearing aid in 2001) because he was OK. the main problem with this is that you cannot come back 10 times to reprogram but the aids work fine and I did save many thousands of $$$ buying online.

#20

I read that in 2007 Oticon is against any sale of hearing aids not through an audiologist. That’s why you hardly find new oticons on Ebay. You can find many Siemens, Hansanton, and others.

#21

Want a cheap hearing aid from a ‘real’ audi? Just ask!

You might strike lucky and find someone who has excess stock, or unwanted trial aids, or who simply needs some money to pay an urgent bill.

What can you lose by asking?

#22

Counterfit hearing aids. Never heard of such a thing,scare tactics. The big manufacturers protect their brand name.

Look it’s real simple… a local professional must charge much more as their expenses are much higher than an internet provider. But the local pro does provide much more and probably better services.

Its up to you, do you want local hand holding or the cheaper distant internet guys.

My advice: Only go with the internet guys if you are an experienced user and are comfortable with the idea of having programmed at a distance. Ed

#23

Unequivocally FALSE statement.

I have seen 6 pairs of counterfeit Siemens hearing aids in the past 16 months alone! They look legit and have serial numbers. But they come from China, and when you call Siemens to verify serial numbers, they will verify that they are counterfeit.

With all due respect Ed, don’t mislead people by making such a claim. I never have and never will resort to “scare tactics”. And anyone who knows me here on this forum can vouch for that. It is a REAL issue that unsuspecting, well-intentioned patients fall prey to all the time.

dr.amy

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#24

Try an audi working with an ENT doctor. I’ve had fairly good luck, for $200, in Seattle.

How did you end up buying?

good luck, elijah

#25

elijah,
Just curious if you even looked at the date of Deafheads post? This thread has been inactive since 12/15/2011; Deafhead joined the Forum on 6/22/2011 and the last time we heard from him was 8/19/2011, so I’m going out on a limb here and guessing that he won’t see your reply and hasn’t been on the Forum for a long time. Dr. Amy has also dropped out in the two year time period also, with her last post being on 3/5/2012. If you’re going to respond to 2 year old posts at least click on their name and see if they are still active otherwise your going to be waisting your time trying to enlighten them.

#26

Dear Seb,

You are one of the posters who has taught me the most, as I read the forums. I really appreciate the contributions you make.

I didn’t pay a lot of attention to dates, since I think that some others may also rummage around in the Forums, finding what they can learn from.
(I do this a good deal.)
So I was writing for general readers, not the posters. Is that silly?

My thought du jour is that people can buy decent used aids for a few hundred dollars (or less) and get them adjusted to an audiogram by mailing to someone who offers that service by mail. I’ve used
donald = hearingguy1@gmail.com for several aids, with flawless service, and moderate charges. < $50 to adjust one aid to my graph.

I’d be very happy to hear from you any time, on the forums or at
lovejoyelijah@gmail.com.

Again, thanks for your input, today and in the past.!!. elijah

#27

Where did you buy them?

#28

That’s 6 years ago. That user didn’t make the move over to the new forum. Who knows where he is now.

#29

I tried clicking on the url you provided but is not an existing web page.