I have the Starkey table mic. It works great but it was pricey.
Sorry - no warranty on eBay and you’re taking a gamble if devices works or not. And one has to wonder if Phonak makes more profit selling Roger devices at “hyped” prices versus hearing aids. If I was to guess I’d bet Phonak (percentage wise) makes more profit on every Roger device sold compared to hearing aid sales.
There is often a warranty on items bought of eBay. Not always, and certainly no factory warranty on hearing aids. The Mylink I bought was new, in the original box. Works perfectly. I have bought several hearing aid related items off eBay as well as two pairs of hearing aids. I did have an issue with a couple of items, but got a refund quickly, with no questions asked. eBay isn’t perfect, but they have done a good job of protecting buyers from unscrupulous sellers. As to Phonak’s profit margins, I don’t think we will ever know. The prices charged by retailers for hearing aids has little to do with what Phonak makes. Just look at the prices that the VA pays for aids. Phonak sells a lot more aids than accessories, so it makes sense that their margins for accessories is higher. But what they charge for Roger stuff isn’t right.
I think until they’re the only one who offers such superb mics, they’ll ask and get the amount they asked for.
I think there’s some progress being made with other manufacturers, but still not enough to be real competition yet. I mean, roger is a whole system of mics and devices, for education. I’m not sure if anyone else does have anything similar of similar quality.
And when it’s for education, that usually means ‘someone else is paying’ 
Since kids often get whatever they need free of charge in many countries, but then also country law might define the prices. In croatia I forgot which one, pen or select price is regulated by country, I think pen.
In Germany kids don’t even have to write to insurance to get approved, everything is automatically approved. That means, public health insurance pays for it, that means all of us.
Oh, so a new hearing aid buyer shells out $5,000, $6000, $7000 for two new Phonak hearing aids. That’s a lot of money. But now the new hearing aid buyer is told, you might want or you should consider buying the Phonak Roger Rip Off, because your $5,000, $6000, $7000 new aids might not do the job completely. What the ?
So the little old lady in her 80’s who can barely afford one new hearing aid, but really needs two is now being told to considering spending $800 plus brand new Rodger Pen. What the ?
If you look at all the accessories or gadgets that are offered with various hearing aids the price range (for all) is roughly between $200 to $400. Give or take a few dollars. But then we have the Roger Pen and Roger select that cost twice as much as all the other hearing aid accessories. Something ain’t right here but maybe the market dictates what expensive attachment sell for.
Bottom line you would think Phonak would look kindly on anyone who shells out over $5000 for hearing aids and give the Roger Pen or Select away for free. Since it probably cost under $100 to make and isn’t necessarily guaranteed to work as promised.
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The flip side to these arguments is that Phonak could say we can’t afford to do the research to create these devices and sell them for a few hundred dollars so they won’t do the research. Does that make people happier?
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I often look at the FCC website for data concerning anything wireless. Anything that emits electromagnetic radiation has to be certified. Manufacturers are allowed to obscure certain data to protect intellectual property. However, there is still a good bit of information there. The system that the TV Connector and Partner Mic uses is quite similar to what Roger devices use. Both are at least somewhat similar to Bluetooth. Frequency hopping spread spectrum. I have opened up both a Roger Select and TV Connector, and the innards are similar. Not the same, of course, but type and number of components, construction are similar. I can’t see that either the cost of development, or manufacturing could be much different. I believe that the system that the TV Connector and Partner Mic use is just Roger with minor adjustments. Phonak charges the prices they do for Roger because they can. It is just that simple.
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Exactly as I thought, there’s no way these things are high tech, it’s not like phonak invented the wheel!
Fact is they don’t sell much of this stuff anyway, but it’s absolutely a rip-off in pricing, but this goes hand in hand with the prices asked for HAs as well.
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For me, the benefits of the Roger devices far outweighs the costs. They have more than paid for themselves. So, not expensive and far from a rip-off.
There is a fair amount of thech in the Roger devices beyond the transmission of the signal
Seems to me from what I have read that there is a fair amount of processing going on
Yes they are expensive, but I think the price is fair given the market. As far as I know nobody else has anything like it. (I could be wrong)
If you think it is unfairly priced, don’t buy it. Simple.
Jim
Yeah to bad for the people who can’t afford the outrageous price but could benefit from them, don’t kid yourself,there’s more tech in your basic smartphone, the problem is that they don’t sell much of this stuff, this is why they charge so much, and of course the old supply and demand, if people didn’t pay the price asked,then they drop untill they do.
Simple
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True of any consumer good from food to housing, to medicine.
A lot of cell phone tech is recycled from earlier models. And I bet all of the various Roger models produced EVER are not even close to a single production run of any single model of cell phone.
Unfortunately there will always be some people priced out of even the most basic hearing solutions, let alone advanced models.
Jim
Not sure if we should call lack of Roger sales - consumer priced out or consumer price gouging. Needless to say if you buy a new hearing aid that needs a $900 accessory - you might just be buying the wrong hearing aid.
@spectrumplay
Best HAs can provide around 5 db snr boost.
Roger can do 10 to 15.
Don’t hold me for exact numbers. It’s just the point that if your snr is low, no HAs can really help you.
@tenkan
Also, I think they did invent that wheel. And select works exceptionally good in loud situations when put on the table in the middle.
I’m not sure if other external mic solutions came even close to that use case.
Select is FM system developed for kids.
@John_Green
Tv connector doesn’t have mic.
Receiving and forwarding the signal is easy.
Producing it is hard.
I’d be surprised if they did use different tech for the same stuff (sending signal to HAs), that wouldn’t make sense at all.
From what I’ve understood, yes they’re doing processing inside those mics as @JBC said.
Also, I’m not sure how many old ladies in their 80s have a need for devices that’s basically meant to be used in really tricky environments. For watching TV there’s affordable TV connector. For hearing one person, there’s partnermic, also not crazy expensive.
Roger is different line, it’s coming from FM system family where emphasis is on creating network of them, where several people have to listen one mic, when those mics have to survive kids voices and still help. Use cases are totally different.
Basically they’re bringing edu fm system to the masses, with giving more features for working people. Because that’s the new target population.
Did you see the ad for pen, select or table mic that showed lady in their 80? I saw kids and I saw working young-middle age people in various working or restaurant situations.
Maybe some old lady does have a use case for it, but she wasn’t the target, so tough luck. Depending on the country, in Germany even such lady could get it through various donations if she explains the reasons to them.
In Croatia and countries around even kids are doomed since they won’t cover even good HAs. Not to mention high margins from sellers of those products.
But phonak isn’t guilty one for that. If they ask 1300 eur for marvel 90, everything else is the profit margin of your fitter. I was quoted 2900 per piece at place that boosts how they offer the lowest prices. No, they just copy ‘recommended prices’. In all other industries you’ll see recommended price striked out and be offered non trivially lower one. In HA industry you can be lucky if you get an offer for ‘just’ recommended price. Mostly it’s higher.
I think select price that phonak wants is around 500-600 eur, can’t remember. Why fitters sell it for at least 1000 and they don’t have to do a shit to make it work except connect them, that’s what we should start asking.
It’s not that those HAs and rogers aren’t expensive to start with (eg what phonak wants), but fitters really do blow them up into the sky.
I think one solution is to really don’t accept those prices but negotiate. I got discount. In Germany. Didn’t have a clue that’s what’s possible 
So my current offer is for 6400 eur worth of equipment (officially by recommend prices), I have to pay 4000, and 700 will pay my insurance. If I manage to write a good case, I have a chance that insurance will pay more, but I have to endure 2 years and go to the court.
Poor ladies in Germany do that. So, that’s also a way.
Not many know about the possibility. But that’s definitely not phonak’s fault.
Also, got discount for the glasses this last Friday.
My effort? ‘uf this one is pricey, I’m not sure I want to try it, do you have something for less’. He said try and we’ll work out numbers later.
Initial sum for 2 lenses and a frame, 430. Offer 350.
And I didn’t even tried negotiating, I was just being honest.
So, let’s start negotiating those prices!
Also those fitters with a ‘how do you hear me now’ method HAVE to get more money since every visit costs and you might need a bunch of them.
Those who do REM based fittings are IMO the only one who can afford price wiggle room, since they probably won’t see you so many times.
The fair version would be that we pay along, so per service, not per prognosis of service eg bundled.
But also, since there’s no service with rogers, if something is wrong with them, they’ll be sent to phonak anyway, fee for sending per case of sending would be fair.
No other service is the fitter doing to them.
Yes, fitting that program for those rare 3 special snowflake heating loss type per year they got. But that’s hearing aid fitting, not mic fitting per se.
No sorry they didn’t, microphones have been around a very long time…but we were referring to the electronic circuit/modules used.
Name this environment that they don’t need because their older.
Lots of older persons use Rodger products. Our local rest home/ retirement village is the perfect situation for FM which they use to full affect.
Yes they have been doing this for a very long long time, I remember the system we had at high school.
FM wasn’t a phonak invention.
Really “tough luck”, that’s a bit harsh, what’s lucky about people not being able to afford this.
Same for a lot of countries, and this is the point, it shouldn’t be.
Say what, they are ones who are directly responsible for this, why… well they are in bed with all the hearing/audiology clinics, they will only sell to them, they get them into their system of how to sell their products " their way"
Phonak and all the manufacturers are a monopoly/ thus a oligopoly and this is the direct reason for the very high prices.
Yes definitely this is what people should try, but your only getting the clinic to drop the price, the manufacturer ( phonak) is still getting their bit, it’s phonak that needs to drop the price to the clinic, which they will ( hopefully) pass on to the consumer.
Seriously?
I mean, that’s their explanation/reasoning - they have to make money out of those infinite hours they take to fit it. I wasn’t clear about it.
But we can’t blame phonak if reseller multiply their prices by factor 2 or more.
That’s insanely high profit margin.
When you buy fridge you’ll see ‘recommended price’ and then you’ll be offered lower one. In HA industry you’re lucky if you get recommended one since that’s often just starting price. That’s insane.
And especially with mics where those resellers don’t provide any significant service. If something breaks while under warranty they’ll just send it back, they won’t repair any part in the office nor selling mics needs hours of setup. So yeah, why are those prices insanely high?
Clinics who don’t fit you properly neither earned it nor deserve the money, and they will still ask and get those insane prices. And that’s our customers fault. We need to demand proper service and unbundled prices.
Yes of course they need profit margin, to pay salaries and bills, but if they’d follow best practices, they’d need let’s say 6 appointments to cover from initial to control and some adjustments (fit takes only 2). Then yearly cleaning and checkups.
With ‘common’ way you need much more time so they need to squeeze money out of you instead by selling more of less expensive aids to more clients since they would have a time to do it.
Also I don’t have a problem with phonak getting their money, they did earn it, they build great product.nwe may discuss if this aid is worth 1300, 1000, or 1500 eur, but in my eyes it just isn’t worth 3000.
That’d be 10 hours of work per 150 eur per hour, or 75 eur for 20 hours. Even my hard case where I go there to make a plan and pickup/return stuff, we are only at 7th hour (3rd fit). And let’s not forget, mostly people buy two HAs, so that’s double the rate.
Earning 200 eur per day (ok netto) here in Germany is considered really high salary (roughly 70000 bruto yearly), like non trivially above average one.
And then they don’t have a clue how sw works but ask for such big prices.
Costco shows how prices could look like. And they’re definitely not a charity and are doing it for profit.
Sorry I just can’t be angry with phonak while those bad fitters are ripping off people.
Ok I get what your saying there.
Yes absolutely, again I can’t agree more, they don’t actually do anything, it’s all on the manufacturers to sort.
Well I guess the good fitters are also offering the same prices tho.
How do they do it? Could only be through volume, they order/buy in bulk one would think.
How does Costco offer lower prices. Think about it. One a Costco audiologist is usually not a certified AudD. Some might not even have a masters, though I believe that is required to even be called an audiologist. That’s not saying those that work at Costco hearing aid centers (contracted I assume) are below par. Far from it. Just saying you probably won’t find a highly trained audiologist with doctored degree working at Costco. So the cost to staff or contract out a Costco hearing aid specialist is way, way less than what you will find at a private HA practice
Second, you won’t find brand new hearing aids that just came out last week or last month or even in the last year at Costco. That’s because Costco only buys hearing aids that have been out for a while, which allows them to purchase at lower prices. Costco also offers hearing aids with different brand names, which might also impact bulk buying costs.
Lastly, Costco really doesn’t have to deal with the cost of leasing office space, limited parking and other small business related costs, that a private hearing dealers has to deal with. That’s a huge advantage and (again) allows for lower overhead, thus lower hearing aid prices. I’m all for Costco, since they are the main driver of lower hearing aid prices, but there are differences between what you get from a private Audi who just sells hearing aids and nothing else versus major bulk warehouses like Costco.
Sad truth is that you don’t need to be dr of audiology to do proper fitting, but you need to have good equipment and willingness to learn and adapt to what patient needs.
From what I see here on forum, a bunch of those ‘doctors’ have neither.
Gimme aurical, and other best practices equipment (yes, I don’t even know the names) and a week to study it and I bet that I can properly do first fit to 90% members of this forum within 2 tries.
And I have patience to figure out those hard 10% cases, which includes reading in detail about them.
And I don’t have anything that resembles medical degree.
I’d like to say that I’m just illustratively exaggerating, but unfortunately I think I’m not, knowing what I know now and seeing posts about experiences here.
I visited 2 respectable ENTs here and they did subpar job of basic audiogram and wrs compared to what my fitter did. And what he does isn’t rocket science. So why on the earth those ent practices couldn’t do it properly? One measured my both ears instead of just bad one. Another didn’t mask low frequencies but high ones and ignored my feedback that I hear it on the good side.
I just 
and I’m happy that I’ve found my fitter. And he doesn’t have dr or similar titles.
But while people pay for the title thinking that they will get competence even after seeing dr cliff and posts here, those bad audis will keep their business alive and kicking.
Not to mention that phonak in their lessons encourages using verification techniques and other best practices. So it’s not that those bad onea didn’t have a way to find out about it.
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Hi Blacky, over the years, I have seen and worked with some the very good and very bad the hearing industry has to offer and there isn’t any substitute for an excellent Audiologist or for that matter an excellent Hearing Aid Dispenser if they are confident, practical and above all patience is the key… Setting up a new HA’s fit takes time, but for some time is money, they want you in and out ASAP. I have often said we need a recommendation list for Audi’s & Dispensers on this forum so peeps can check them out prior to any appointment…
As for programming your own aids, I have dabbled in this for a few years and it’s not rocket science especially with the software they have available nowadays, it’s pretty difficult to set up hearing aids incorrectly, but somehow the more incompetent (Audi’s & Dispensers) still manage to do so, perhaps they are technophobes? I do have the current Target software, iCube and Noah Link Wireless, but in all truth I cannot better my current Audioligist, she just excellent at what she does and I have tried to improve her settings, to no avail, I always revert back to her original settings, so much so I do not even try anymore as I know they are set at their optimum level and I am very fortunate to have such a fine and extremely helpful Audiologist… Cheers Kev 