My Phonak M90 purchase from eBay

My Ebay experience with this stuff is mixed. I ordered 2 Phonak Roger pens from 2 different vendors. One was perfect, like new, works great, under $100. The other was a scam, nothing came except a fake tracking number. But, I opened a claim with Ebay and got a full refund the next day.

I thought I’d do a follow-up after my appointment with the new audiologist.

The appointment was this morning, and it went great. He confirmed that my eBay purchased M90s are indeed genuine devices, and were from Korea. They are covered by the international warranty for a year, and the other two years would have to be worked out with the Korean supplier (which was what the eBay listing indicated).

The audiologist did a Real Ear Measurement, and his assistant explained what that was and how it all worked. They worked together (I think he was training her) and did several adjustments. The hearing aids, which I thought were fine when I went in, were much better after the adjustments. They increased amplification across the frequency spectrum, but especially on the high frequencies, and I can tell the difference. Almost as importantly, the HA’s seem more “balanced” now. In the past, even with my previous Q90s, it seemed like the left side was doing “more” of the hearing than the right. I’ve always just figured it seemed that way because my hearing is so much worse in my left ear. In the few hours since the appointment though, the set of aids feels much more “balanced” (I can’t think of a better term to describe the sensation). Now, when I turn my head, I can easily hear the difference as the sound source changes direction. The difference isn’t even subtle, it’s very noticeable.

As far as the “purchased elsewhere” and “bundled/unbundled” issues go, I was upfront with the audiologist about how the purchase was made, and why. He understood, verified that the devices were genuine (he said he was a little worried that they may not be). There was a fee ($100) to transfer the registration and set me up in their system, plus the $250 for the REM and the adjustment to the aids. Both he and his assistant were very patient in answering my questions, and he gave me a list of the unbundled prices.

All in all, a very good experience. I’m not saying the route I took would be best for everyone; as a matter of fact, I would have much rather been able to just buy the HAs the normal route. But, this worked with the limited funds I had to spend, and I’m very satisfied.

On a related note, I’ve ordered the Noahlink Wireless, and will take a look at what self-programming I may be able to do on my own.

@Psych1 said:

My Ebay experience with this stuff is mixed. I ordered 2 Phonak Roger pens from 2 different vendors. One was perfect, like new, works great, under $100. The other was a scam, nothing came except a fake tracking number. But, I opened a claim with Ebay and got a full refund the next day.

That’s a problem not limited to purchasing hearing aids. I had a similar (but even trickier) issue with purchasing a Garmin GPS. I received a tracking number, and then a verification of delivery. However, the delivery notice stated that it was “signed at the front office”. The problem with that is that there is no front office, I don’t live in an apartment, and no one had been to my house (I was home at the time). I immediately filed a claim with eBay. They reimbursed me, and no problem there.

I did some research, and found this is how the scam works. Someone sets up a new account, advertises something at a good but not ridiculously low price, then ships a package that’s just an empty envelope (or junk in the envelope). They pick out a business in the same zip code, knowing it will be routinely signed for by someone in receiving or a front office (in my case, the envelope was delivered to a local retail store). They can then “prove” to eBay that the package was delivered, which delays the claim process long enough for them to close their account completely, and keep their ill gotten money.

HAs are no different than any other purchase on eBay - be careful, check out your seller, pay with a payment method that offers a recourse if you’re scammed.

So later this year or early next year when OTC hearing aids hit the market, we will soon see those same (now used) OTC hearing aids hit the eBay market. Someone buys a OTC hearing aid but doesn’t like, yet is stuck with it. So he/she sells it on eBay as new or used. “Oh and its only been used twice but now I want to sell it to someone who can truly enjoy it”. But we won’t tell you we dropped in on the hard concrete floor a few times (OK - just kidding).

Hey I like eBay and a have bought many things on it. But I’m not going to buy a $400 hearing aid for $50 dollars and I’m not going to buy a (supposed) $3000 HA for $600. Reason why - I can’t see it in my hands before I buy. I can’t put HA in my ear before I buy. I can’t take HA to Widex, Phonak, Oticon, etc, and ask them to check it out, before I buy since I didn’t buy the hearing aid directly from them.

So to make the “buy HA at eBay crowd happy” I’ll admit when OTC aids go live, eBay a couple months later is going to see a huge jump in hearing aids for sale. Why - because probably half of the folks buying a OTC hearing aid won’t like it or won’t use it or just let it sit on a dresser top. When that happens eventually the light comes on and someone thinks “I need to sell my OTC HA I just bought four months ago on eBay”.

And of course should it not sell on eBay there is always bottom barrel Craigslist. Or a neighborhood yard sale.

100% agree with you, gadgetman.

I have bought a pair of Phonak M90s online from an established British business (that trades on eBay and has its own separate website) for $2600.I now have an all-in $150/year service agreement with my local audiologist which includes clinic visits, cleaning, consumables, REM and retuning. My home insurance covers loss and damage. The Phonaks have a year’s international warranty and 2 years UK warranty. But I have spent several evenings researching what I need in order to be more confident that I am making the right decision. This forum helped. A lot.

I think there are elements of buying online that make it a challenge if you are relatively inexperienced. Reading this thread would give people a heads up on what to look for but a lot of the same sense that one would use to buy any item over $1k can be employed here.

I see the process of hearing aid purchase as being classic unbundling. I don’t want a conversation with my audiologist about cost of hearing aids. I just want to talk about how I can make the most of my hearing and hardware. Very happy to pay separately for that advice. Experience tells me that a good audiologist/HA fitter can get so much more out of these devices.

For what its worth my tips for buying online, especially if importing:

1. Does the selling platform (e.g. ebay) have a remedy if the purchase goes wrong? How confident do you feel about the business if it doesn’t have a reputation to maintain?
2. Factor in the cost of an audiogram at some point. Some suppliers can program the aids before they send them. In other cases this is up to you to organize
3. Factor in the cost of REM testing and re-tuning as either a service contract or per visit cost with a local audiologist.
4. Check the warranty. Different manufacturers have different warranties in different regions.
5. If you are importing from another country, check that you are not paying local sales taxes unnecessarily (That can happen automatically with eBay) and factor in import duty if relevant (in the US its 10%)
6. When paying by credit card or PayPal. make sure you pay in the local currency, not your own. Your credit card company’s exchange rate may well be hundreds of dollars cheaper than that of PayPal.

I am sure there are more items in a comprehensive checklist. I offer these as a community gesture based on what I learned from the forum and my experiences. Hope this helps someone else.

@Ukpa said:

I now have an all-in $150/year service agreement with my local audiologist which includes clinic visits, cleaning, consumables, REM and retuning. My home insurance covers loss and damage.

Wow!! $150 a year is great. I paid $350 for one appointment. The clinic I found in my area offers a three year full service for (I think) $1400 that I’ll consider later, but that’s no where near the deal you got.

@Ukpa said:

If you are importing from another country, check that you are not paying local sales taxes unnecessarily (That can happen automatically with eBay) and factor in import duty if relevant (in the US its 10%)

The seller I bought from included duty fees in the free shipping, so that wasn’t a factor. However, eBay did charge me sales tax automatically, and I had to jump through some hoops to get that removed, but they finally credited it back to me.

This is absolutely correct. My assistant used to pull her hair out at the “We pay 80% of the cost of the hearing aids to the allowable amount after deductible and out-of-pocket” language used when she would call to verify coverage. It’s confusing, and I think it’s meant to be.

Had a really tough time with one patient. We called to verify 4 times (by 4 different staff members) and was told every time that the insurance would cover 100% of the patient’s hearing aids. This particular patient had a HF hearing loss and tinnitus that was so bad she had almost lost her child due to the stress and was suicidal. The hearing aids dropped the tinnitus perception down to a level she could manage. It was a beautiful thing to see.

Three weeks later we get the notice that the insurance coverage was denied. No real explanation. We called and called, gave reference numbers for each of the verification calls, etc. Each time we countered one of their reasons for denying coverage, they would magically come up with another reason. It was disgusting.

I went to the franchisee and plead the patient’s case. I said that if they wanted to repossess her hearing aids, they could do it themselves. I couldn’t do it. I thought doing so would be unethical.

Eventually, to the franchisee’s credit, they just let the patient have the aids and wrote it off as a loss.

Glad to hear that the state of Maine has put a mandate in place. A nice one, too. New Hampshire has a pretty good mandate. I’m pushing for one in Oklahoma.

If you actually bought from ebay you’d know that everything has a 30 day guarantee now. As long as you take the pair to your audi to get checked and programmed / tuned within that time, you have no risk. I’ve bought several pairs on ebay over the years including my $600 pair of Livio 2400s, and only once had a problem. I’ve saved thousand$!

@youbgone said:

Hey I like eBay and a have bought many things on it. But I’m not going to buy a $400 hearing aid for $50 dollars and I’m not going to buy a (supposed) $3000 HA for $600. Reason why - I can’t see it in my hands before I buy. I can’t put HA in my ear before I buy. I can’t take HA to Widex, Phonak, Oticon, etc, and ask them to check it out, before I buy since I didn’t buy the hearing aid directly from them.

daali, is there an online description of the noah wireless link and the Phonak Target 6.x application and how to use them with Phonak Audeo Marvel? Do they come with a user manual?

OK so how does one “save” their current settings before embarking upon an illegal journey of self discovery in the world of DIY with Target?? And how do you reload that saved copy if upon your journey you happen to screw up? Inquiring minds want to know…
Thanks…

When Target connects to your HAs, it asks whether to use the settings from the HAs or from the current session. You answer from the HAs. Then you close and save the session to the database (but not to the HAs, in case you accidentally changed something since you loaded from them). To restore at any later time, you can open that session (as long as you haven’t explicitly deleted it), connect to the HAs, answer from the current session (i.e., the old saved one), close and save the session to the HAs.

Don’t just trust the local database on your Target setup to be a perfect fail-safe. What if you lose your setup?

I believe you can also EXPORT a saved session as a file you can store somewhere else, so that if you ever lose your installed software setup, you can do a fresh install, IMPORT your backed up file into a session, and restore your HA fitment.

Email that file to yourself, and you can always restore your HA fitment from any Target software setup.

Indeed. I export the client (I don’t think you can export a single session) after every session to a local directory that’s mirrored in the cloud.

@shawn.garza said:

Glad to hear that the state of Maine has put a mandate in place.

Mandate to what? (News to me.)

Probably does not matter. My health insurance paid $32 for a $100 hearing test, and after that it’s all my money. (Unless the mandate goes further?)