There can be good reasons not to repackage Patient A’s hearing aids for Patient B’s use. I would not count ethical considerations among them, at least not as a blanket policy. Where it can be unethical to do this is if the Patient A’s aids are inappropriate for Patient B’s hearing loss. But when an audiologist makes that the policy for every aid and every patient, the audiologist is saying that financially it just doesn’t work for the audiologist. There are audiologists who will deal with used aids, particularly if that’s all a patient can afford. If you’re in an area with few choices for hearing services, this may not be possible, but in a populated area, if you call around, you can probably find an audiologist who will work with you on this. You should expect to have to pay fitting and adjustment appointment fees and assume the financial risk that an aid may not be possible to refurb. It’s not fair to get mad at the audiologist because you shelled out several hundred dollars in refurb costs and appointment fees for an aid that in the final analysis couldn’t be made to work or with which after all the repairs and fittings, you were ultimately dissatisfied.
Backlash over such problems can be another reason besides pure profit motive that some audiologists don’t want to get involved with used aids. Some people who are determined to do this can also make a lot of noise when it doesn’t work out.