first I want to say this is a awesome website! I spent a good part of yesterday afternoon on here Reading Post in learning a ton of stuff.
(Contrary to what my girlfriend says lol) my hearing is just fine but I am here for my grandma who I am carring for full time (outside of work hours.)
Until yesterday I knew almost nothing about hearing aids but just in the short time I have learned a ton yet I feel like I haven’t even touch the surface yet.
We have both sets of hearing aids donated to us from a family member to try out but can only keep one of them. Which one should we go with? From what I’ve learned so far these are Costco units and we will have to go to them to have them programmed? How does the warranty work? Will that transfer to my grandma? Will there be a charge for reprogramming them?
I welcome any and all input about any of this.
We sincerally appreciate it.
If the latest one is a KS6 there would have been a 3 year warranty (I think). The 7 was released in Sept 2016, so it is possible there is some warranty left. Depends on when they were purchased.
I have no idea if Costco will transfer them and set them up. If they will not transfer and work with you, the hearing aids are worthless. Those two models are locked to Costco.
They do have premium hearing aids for $1600/pair.
Also, on eBay there are hearing aids that are a few models behind the current models, for a few hundred dollars. But, I would talk to some audiologists in your area to see if one would set up used ones from eBay. Many will not. If they will set them up I would expect to pay $400-800 depending on how many adjustment sessions are involved. Some will do a package deal and some will do pay-as-you-go. Package deals can result in better performance because you are not trying to save money by not getting that last adjustment.
The KS 6 had a 2 year warranty. he warranty on mine expired earlier this year.
The new KS8 appear to be much better for speech recognition than the KS6 for me, at least.
The US card is from Citi Bank.
I am not disputing what you said. I just said the US policy is different…
We do not know what country @randy1 has residence.
Thank you everyone for the replies. We are in the USA, Michigan to be exact.
Just got out of work and need to sit down and read the replies more thouroughly but from what I’ve gathered so far this is a sad situation. My grandma has been without hearing aids for several years because of the cost. Just cannot afford to shell out even $1000 for them. We have 2 very nice sets that have been donated to use and they will probably be useless. Very sad that something still so functional cannot be made available to those in need. To be very honest I have wondered for a few years now why there isn’t some type of recyling for these?? .I mean something like an organ donor but for hearing aids?
But, I am going to follow up on this more in hopes we might be able to make something work out. A trip to the closest Costco with grandma is going to be a challenge due to distance but doable. I believe we can get the original purchaser to go with us. To be honest I don’t even care about the warranty so much as just being able to get something functional for her. We have been in contact with local Senior agencies and assistance places but nothing has paned out so far.
If these are found to be unusable how difficult is it to get setup and perform the programming and of something decent that’s used from eBay? My background includes 13 years as a broadcast engineer/IT Administrator for a group of radio stations so I’m familiar and have a bit of an ear for audio from a broadcast, studio quality standpoint. Even more importantly I’m a huge diy’er and really enjoy doing stuff like that. (I noticed the diy forum but haven’t had a chance to venture over there yet, just figured I would ask since I have the question open already.) If that might be an avenue we could take anyone have any recommendations on manufactures and models?
I really do appreciate and and all input. I mean ‘WE’ lol
Randy1, Check with your local Lions club. They have a foundation that does that. They reprogram donated HA for lower income people. They may be able to reprogram the HA’s you have.
Why don’t you call Costco first and explain the situation? I think person to person transfers between family members is OK. They will either say yes or no.