Ever Felt Like You Were Ripped Off?

I definitely think if you feel like you cannot fully trust the audie to work FOR you, and not just for your money, you should interview another. I’m getting to believe that all the top hearing aids are terrific: oticon, resound, siemens, widex, and more - but it’s the audies and how they program our aids that makes the biggest difference. I started out with years ago with wonderful people who moved away. Then hooked up with a group connected to a major teaching hospital in Philly, and that person was pretty rude - I finally left her, and am now trying a new person, who seems pretty savvy and willing to work with me.
Remember that part of that $6000 ± that you are paying for the aids is going toward the future service on those hearing aids, so the audie has to be willing to work with you from the getgo, or you won’t get the service that you’ve paid for, and deserve.

@Khenkels said:

I am beginning to feel scamed…or maybe it is the arrogance of these people. Yesturday, I was told that “I” was the only person that has had so many problems and needed so many adjustments…:rolleyes: :eek:

Not only would I walk out the door if I heard a comment like that, I would report them to your state attorney general. To me, harrassing a customer like that amounts to an unfair business practice. After all, the money you pay is not only for the hearing aid itself, it is for the advice and adjustments and some people need more than others.

I am planning to talk to people who have hearing aids in my community, and my doctor who I trust, prior to picking an audiologist.
I would have no hesitation to take legal action if I was ripped off and Texas has particularly powerful consumer fraud statutes but I don’t want to do that if I can avoid it, so I will research first.

Along the way, if I hear scam stories, I will help those I hear. Audiology services are valuable and worth money. Audiologists spend time and their own money gaining experience and I do not mind paying for that as it benefits me. Scammers are worthless and worth retribution.

I never would have thought people would review hearing centers on Yelp, but some do. This is another good resource to check.

We as an audiologist profession are moving toward a doctoring curriculum. This mean that we need a more extensive training program toward hearing and balance pathologies. Any complaint toward any audiologist professional can be addresses to the local Audiology academy or the national American Academy of Audiology. Both entities have ethical panel that have the responsibility to evaluate any complaint of patient toward any audiologist. Also all audiologist have to be license by the government. This is very important and imperative that any patient that visit an audiologist office check all the credential of fellow audiologist. You can visit the American Academy of Audiologist to find fellow member of the academy by state location. This can be a good starting point to find a competent audiologist.

After 2 years of ‘‘Well come in and we will adjust them’’ my Siemen’s Cielos never did work right, still aren’t working right, keep drifting to the shrill end, and now the provider tells me it is too late to do anything. I feel I was sold a defective product, and then strung along until it was too late. Ripped off is a mild way of putting it.

Would i be correct in saying that you are really at the mercy of the audiologist ?

Thats say you meet an audiologist who makes a larger margin selling a certain model or brand or wants to promote a name brand for whatever reason not known to you. Considering he or she is the audiologist they can program whatever they want to program into a digital HA. They can do as they choose if you have not done the research and found someone you can trust .

A simple example is in an electronics shop. If you want to push a particular model or brand you simply step up the contrast or use a better signal into the brand you want too push. Look you can see for yourself Sir that this TV clearly has a better picture ? Yep that looks clear too me ! Sign me up !

So in the end the audiologist is clearly the person in control and it is very important they have only your best interest in mind. I would suggest THAT MOST DO HAVE YOUR BEST INTEREST IN MIND . Find one of them and you should have a full satisfaction guaranty that they are impartial and can get the job done.

@cortez said:

I can see your point after say 5 years after the model is phased out. However, Oticon raised the repair cost beginning 12 months after the purchase and ratcheting up every year. Within this 5 year period, the manufacturer can (at least should) expect aids coming back for repair given that 5 years is a typical wear period.

In my experience in the UK manufacturers usually charge a fixed standard repair fee to the dispenser.

(Warranties usually run for 2 years before repair fees are incurred.)

If your supplier has THEIR OWN rather creative fee schedule, perhaps that could explain the situation?

@Normandy said:

My Audi told me that my old hearing aids (Siemens) could not be repaired and suggested that I buy new ones. I sent them to an online repair shop and they repaired them for me for $99 each. When I received them back they sounded great. So much for not being able to be repaired.

The audi would have sent the aid to Siemens, who would have decided it is DBR’d as it is too old. So the problem lies with Siemens (and other manufacturers) and not the aud. HearSource would have most likley replaced parts such as mic or receiver with generic parts.

May be little about six months back Costco, Rohnert park sold me a pair of Hearing Aid called Avio ITE, i paid almost $ 3000.00 it was very frustrating experience with this hearing aid and programmer, any noise or in restaurant it impossible to hear any one, this hearing Aid was worst then those old sound amplification kind of . I had to communicate Inerton expert to guide me and they told me i should not be using this hearing aid after studing my two audiograms. They recommended me Avio 3. Now Costco says that all hearing aids are useless for me since i have nerve deafness and it is over 60%.
Can anyone guide me which hearing aid is good for nerve deafness? My work environment is public place so i have to deal with lots of noise.
Costco will not sell me Avio 3 because i am too demanding. If i was given wrong hearing aid by their own staff then it is my fault? Getting an appointment at Costco is Luck, some time it takes 4-5 week for reprogramming. It is great company and great customer service however their hearing department in Sonoma county suck.

@hearnow said:

The audi would have sent the aid to Siemens, who would have decided it is DBR’d as it is too old. So the problem lies with Siemens (and other manufacturers) and not the aud. HearSource would have most likley replaced parts such as mic or receiver with generic parts.

HearNow, there is no such thing as a “generic” electronic part. A mic is a mic and a speaker is a receiver. Most all come very few manufacturers in the world. Please don’t confuse a hearing aid manufacturer (assembler) with an electronics or component manufacturer. Unfortunately, you may be right about Siemens not repairing their own hearing aids, but these were only 4 1/2 years old. My personal feeling was that the audi. needed a sale.

Had two Beltone representatives sell me top of the line digital HAs then never were able to adjust properly. Then after two years of screwing around with them, they want to sell me new, better latest technology. Beltone is no help, will not stand behind their product or their representatives. I may be burned by somebody else, but never again by Beltone.

Hi,

I just came back from my audiologist after a week-long test of very expensive hearing aids. I’ve been going to him for about 5 years. I can’t afford a new one right now so I asked him to adjust my current aids. He took each one out of the room to vacuum them out, as he worked on each one. Later, when I picked up my newest and best one, I noticed it was cracked. he had taken off the door to insert the programming connection (which I’d never noticed him do before.) However, the crack was not at the hinge but at the vent, as he pointed out. I never noticed the crack before, which was quite substantial going almost down the whole length of the hearing aid, with a chunk at the vent and in the middle missing. Seems to me I would have noticed it before. He said it was a good thing I saw it and would have to be rebuilt sometime, soon. He then put some clear stuff on it that looked like nail polish.

Hmmmm.

I’m suspicious, by nature, I think. And I’m suspicious of this, esp. since a few months ago I accompanied a friend to a different audiologist because she needed work on her hearing aid. She’s 90. He was a new audiologist to her. Somehow the hinge broke while there. Also, the hearing aid became cracked. It was old, which was the xplanation. he put some clear stuff on it. Found another hinge that miraculously fit, And didn’t charge her. It was all very cumbaya. He invited us to a hearing aid special event the following week. My friend bought a new hearing aid from him because he was so nice and helpful. I checked out the prices of the hearing aid he found for me and discovered them for much lower prices online. Said I’d think about it.

I’m reminded of what I used to hear about auto mechanics causing damage so they could fix it.

Could this be true!!! Has anyone else discovered a damaged hearing aid after going to the audiologist?

Thanks.

Hey, this sort of thing happens.

Someone brings in an old aid, possibly dirty.

Your clean it with a wipe, brush out any muck … and - kapow - the darned thing falls apart!

Programming connectors are the worst … the pins corrode invisibly … you stick in the cable … and disaster.

Once I received an aid which fell apart when inserting the connector … it was out of warranty so the client DEMANDED that I pay for the damage. I later found that the aid had been exposed to months of salt spray …

I have become much more cautious nowadays : people complain about greedy dispensers … but there are also many end users who don’t want to pay for repairs and who KNOWINGLY & UNFAIRLY dump the bill onto the dispenser.

I don’t make much money and I try to offer a fair low cost service, so I find this sort of behaviour difficult to deal with.

I’m going to write him a letter because the sequence of events doesn’t make sense.

How is it possible that the audi and I handled the hearing aid several times while he showed me that the little plastic insert had wax in it, using a doctors magnifier light, and neither of us noticed the crack, then?

He and I also used the doctors magnifier to look at where the microphone was, as opposed to the microphone hole in the battery door on this particular model, so I could clean it properly. Yet, neither of us noticed a crack, large gouge in the vent and chips along the crack in the body at that time!!!

I suppose the damage could have happened after we inspected it, while he was vacuuming it, or even when he took the door off. If it did, why didn’t he show it to me and tell me about it, at that time, esp. since the crack made the hearing aid body fairly UNSTABLE!!!

The only explanation seems to be that the crack and gouges spontaneously happened AFTER he laid it on the table but before he programmed it, since that’s when I noticed it––from across the table.

Good thing you saw that, he says. It will be a couple of hundred dollars to remake a body. Fortunately they have it digitized.

Good thing.

Salt, you say, or something??? Uh-huh. A customer trying to lay off repairs on the dispenser? Uh-huh.

Happens all the time, you say? Uh-huh.

Why did he have to remove the battery door to program it?? And why didn’t he say anything if it happened when he was working on it and because of my bad care? Why did I have to point it out to him, how could he have missed it while we/he was doing all those things to it?

When I first saw it, I made myself ask him if he did it when he took off the door, which was really hard for me to confront him. but he pointed out that the crack started on the vent side and not the hinge side, putting me on the defensive, Immediately. Making me question myself and confusing me. First, I thought he did it on purpose to make a buck. then I felt badly about that. So now I give him the benefit of the doubt that he made a mistake but is not mature enough to own up to it. Either way. He will never get another dime from me. He will get a Yelp! whether he makes good on it or not. Unless he totally apologizes! I’m sick of being at the mercy of medical “professionals.” Sick of it.

I’m just wondering if any other customers have had anything similar happen to them in an audiologist’s office? And what they thought.

Since the process of getting a hearing aid is so expensive and opaque, I need all the information and support I can get so I don’t feel or get ripped off.

Thanks.