Recommendations for where to buy Hearing Aids Online (I have a local audiologist for a la carte services & support)

Hearing Aids
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Hello Fellow Hearing Aid Wearers!

I have severe profound hearing loss and in desperate need of new hearing aids to function.

I’ve stumbled upon a local audiologist that offers a la carte hearing aid services such as programming, office visits for maintenance, cleaning, adjustments, etc, ear impressions and ear molds, etc.

So I’m looking to purchase hearing aids online. I see that they are about half the price than buying it from an audiologist. (7k from audiologist, vs 3.5k from online vendors).

The two online websites i am comparing is fithearing.com and directhearing.com
Has anyone purchased with either of them? What was your experience like? Do you recommend them? Anything to look out for? Have they been around and established for some time, or will they disappear overnight?

I have heard of ziphearing.com, they are charging $4.5k usd and offer a local audiologist. I also looked at wholesalehearing.co.uk, but they are in UK. They don’t offer loss warranty, just damage/repair warranty, although its 5 years of warranty, and plus I don’t know if I will get hit with customs/duty fees. (I’m located in the US).

Any advice?

My hearing aid background if you are interested:

I’ve been wearing hearing aids for over 15-20 years, first started with phonak audeo’s in early 2000’s, and loved that they were bright green in color, but the sound wasn’t so great. The marketing materials and magazines were great for showcasing phonak audeo in a distinct light. However I didn’t like the compilot around my neck. And an echo that other people could hear when using the mic. I’ve then had a couple of more phonak audeos, then my audiologist recommended resound, so I have gone through resound quattros, and currently use resound one. I was considering the resound nexia when costco released jabra ep 20, so I am currently trialing the jabra but i find the sound very harsh and loud. I found a local audiologist and did a trial of phonak audeo infinio sphere i90 and found them to be amazing. the sound is so calm and soft, yet clear, compared to the jabra. I asked the audiologist that programmed the phonak to program the jabra from costco, and they said costco had set my audiogram to a much worse/higher value so the sound was harsh. So my plan is to return the jabra to costco and get a pair of phonak audeo’s!

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I have used both FitHearing and ZipHearing. I recommend them both, depending on what level of service you need. I purchased my Phonak Infinio Spheres from FitHearing and my Phonak Lumity 90’s from Zip. I switched to FitHearing because I now do my own programming.

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Philip at fixyourears.com is very good to deal with. I have bought from him and he is very knowledgeable at setting aids up and will work with you.

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You could buy used or buy at Costco and program at your local place, or try to source new as cheaply as possible. Wholesale cost is closer to $2,500 or even less for some models so you could possibly due better than $3,500. You might want to give the local place an opportunity to match what you find.

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Does ziphearing is available only in USA?

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Thanks for your replies all. I got a great deal on Phonak Audeo Infinio Sphere 90’s hearing aids for black friday!

I wanted to go with wholesalehearing.co.uk based on the good reviews I read here on the forums, and they had a black friday deal going on as well.

However, I wasn’t sure if my insurance company would cover an out of network claim if its an international claim. Also I gave some thought to the offered warranty services, and having to ship hearing aids back and forth to UK from USA would have been an expensive hassle.

I reached out to fithearing.com and directhearing.com, and they both offered to match wholesalehearing.co.uk’s pricing, so i went with one of them as they’re based in the usa and i’ll have less hassle with an out of network insurance claim.

Both fithearing.com and directhearing.com email support was incredibly quick and responsive, and answered all of my detailed specific questions, so I would recommend both of them for anyone looking for hearing aids.

I still have to have my first fit, so we will see how that goes. But I’ve been wearing the phonak’s as they came pre-programmed with domes and they’ve been great so far.

I didn’t try ziphearing.com because it was out of my budget.

I have Jabra’s from Costco, which I think I am going to return because I can’t hear anything with them, and they are terrible in noisy environments like restaurants. I can hear A LOT better with the Phonak’s, so hopefully that will bide me some time before having to get an implant. However, the Jabra hearing aids work great with iphone and making phone calls as they use the iphone’s microphone. With the Phonak, I can’t use them for phone calls as they use the hearing aid’s microphone and no one can hear what i’m saying.

I am considering getting a pair of phillips 9050 from costco for making phone calls. The reviews say they have AI and are good in noisy environments compared to Jabra, and they use the iphone microphone for phone calls, and also have telecoil.