Roger Select, A Huge Investment - I'm disappointed - Phonak and My Audiologist both failed me

Left leaning or not, and in no defence of Phonak; the device was supplied by the Audiologist. They are responsible for the refund.

An Audi’s commission for selling the Roger Pen and Select is HUGE. Thus you will find many who will pump these devices more so for personal financial gain, then actual user benefit. Seriously if I’m sitting at a table with a few friends (4) I should be able to hear fairly well with a “state of the art” hearing aid. That just cost me $$$$. But now my Audi suggests the Select as a support device for $$$$. Of course if I’m sitting with my friends with background noise, music, etc., the select is useless. And should someone place a pitcher of beer in front of my “Select” on the table it won’t work. Blocking signal transmission. You have to be very careful researching these devices before you buy, especially if your Audi is really pushing them just for the HUGE commission,

I know you don’t like our profession, but stick to the facts.

The margin on the Roger devices isn’t at the level you describe. Relative to other sales, the return is pretty meagre, if you consider the amount of time, effort and ongoing support these devices need.

If you want to have a go at anyone, perhaps you should look at the chain Audiology businesses owned/driven by the main manufacturers. It’s the vertical integration of the market that keeps the profits within a small group of companies.

The OP has a problem with the service at the point of purchase, railing against the whole industry with your unresolved rage doesn’t resolve their issue in any way and certainly doesn’t add to the merits of the discussion.

Please don’t shoot the messenger. I believe kcsummerkc opened this topic up so he/she is fair game and not others.

Couple more things to add here.
I remember reading an essentially internal Phonak note some years back (2015?) by one of their people who had worked extensively on the Roger pen. He mentioned it had taken them 7 years to create this thing and bring it to the market. His piece also spelled out some of the limitations of hearing aids at the time - where they work ok and where they won’t. It was obviously not written by someone in the marketing department who would only talk about the good points.
Dr Cliff’s YouTube video’s are also a good learning tool. I noted him saying that after he has done the Audiogram and sound conduction tests, a very high priority for him is the find out the WRS score as was mentioned above. A high score tells him hearing aids can help a bunch if programmed well. A low score means a real struggle with low chances of customer satisfaction. He is a big believer in REM testing to check on how the manufacturer’s first fit software has worked - and then using the REM equipment to finish the job and get the hearing aid to closely match the prescription.
He shows examples of fittings done by some Costco fitters or audi’s that were poorly done and then brought to him to see if he could improve things by the dissatisfied customer, while also pointing out that Costco has good audi’s too. His REM procedure was able to save the day for several customers. Before and after charts were dramatic. Maybe the audi was fresh out of school.
Lastly - Audi’s can be great and helpful. But very few of them use Roger equipment themselves so their experience can be lacking on the fine details. We day-to-day users have to do our homework too if we want to get the most out of this equipment. As folks on this site know, all the right info is not in the user manual. And you have to look around to learn.

Something more - Zoom meetings.

This probably should be on a thread of it’s own, but since this thread is largely on assistive equipment such as Roger stuff I will add it here.

I belong to a retired men’s discussion group. We have met monthly for a number of years. In pre Covid days we would take turns in meeting at each other’s homes - say in the living room - for a two hour discussion.
Not exactly conducive for a guy with a major hearing problem - but with Roger pens - sometimes networked - I persevered and picked up what I could. I also got my Cochlear implant in this period and that helped a lot too.

Since about last April we switched to Zoom. Each guy used his laptop or Ipad or even iPhone and we carried on. I would use either a Roger pen or more lately the Select plugged into the earphone outlet on the laptop. I found the clarity of the the Select to be a little better.
For me it’s been great and I thought I should point out why.

Every other guy has his own mic on his device. And they all work fine.
Due to the format only one person can speak at a time.
My Select connects to both my Phonak hearing aid and my Cochlear implant and I have no problem understanding unless the speaker has English as a second language and pronounces word a little different.

Overall a big help to me. Perhaps it could help you.

Thanks for sharing your experiences with Roger Select. Does one of the cables provided have a small slot to plug the Roger Select into? I’m trying to figure out if I have all the connectors I should. The one I do have that is to go into the TV doesn’t fit any of the jacks on my TV and its not an old TV which was a big item on my list I wanted to discuss with Phonak representative but the first time he didn’t understand one of the cables I got with the device and the second told me straightaway he couldn’t help because I was using hearing aids to talk to him which seems silly that a manufacturer of my hearing aids says I need to not use them on the phone. If I couldn’t use them on the phone I might throw them in the trash today, only reason not to would be I enjoy songbirds and they work good for that.

I haven’t the funds to try different hearing aids. It was a stretch to get what I have. But I’m feeling like timing was against me when I got this device. Moving to a smaller location, having no audiologist, no phone or computer connection and barely, sometimes non-functioning hearing aids has pushed me to the limit of my endurance.

I can’t really say too much else because the only thing clear from what I’m writing (it seems to me) is that I am an ANGRY PERSON and who needs that? I wouldn’t blame people for not wanting to talk to me or help me BUT PLEASE UNDERSTAND MY ENTIRE LIFE HAS BEEN TURNED UPSIDE DOWN moving to this small town to escape the violence that took over in my old neighborhood. I mourn my home that I loved and my garden and flowers and the birds and the little wren who came every spring. I miss the funny squirrels I used to feed, going out last winter in the middle of heavy snows to replenish food supplies of stray kitties, the birds and squirrels. I’m angry I was forced to flee the violence and leave my home of 30 years behind.

I’m not a bad person but I can see why people might want to avoid me.

I never requested a refund because I never was told how long I had to try them. I thought it would be 3 months like my hearing aids but then was told it was a week or two and I was already past that. But why is that different for everyone. It seems a crap shoot basically, some people had 3 months and others no trial or very short.

COVID bears a lot of responsibility. My audiologist I worked with and had good luck disappeared and so I was “squeezed in” with appointments with someone I didn’t know and didn’t know me. She was much different from the one I used to see.

I keep saying the same thing over here trying to respond because I don’t want people to think after they took the trouble of writing to me that I’m dismissing their efforts.

I’m just at my wits end and feel quite isolated much of the time and my family is farther away now. I’m finding the world to be a very alien threatening scary place too much of the time.

I couldn’t go back to the original provider because she was scared of covid and vanished. This is not my fault no matter how much you want to blame me.

MY MISTAKE THAT IT SEEMS I NEED TO OWN IS THAT I WAS A TRUSTING PERSON WHO BELIEVED MY AUDIOLOGIST NOT KNOWING IT WAS THE LAST TIME I WOULD SEE HER.

AND MY MISTAKE WAS COMING HERE TRYING TO EXPLAIN SOMETHING TO PEOPLE LIKE YOU.

XXXXXXXX
The system says I didn’t write enough and messages me that what I wrote doesn’t seem like a complete sentence and won’t let me post until I write more.

SO THESE LAST FEW LINES BETWEEN THE XXXXX’S I was forced to write when I was already quite thru and fed up.

XXXXX

THANK YOU, KIND SIR OR MADAM for trying to be the voice of reason. I appreciate you very much for trying to understand the situation while a few behave more like vultures.

I should not have posted here because its all for naught. It hasn’t helped because I was frustrated and lost before and now more so. I am angry but NOT AT YOU.

Before anyone attacks me for being admittedly angry please consider the reasons for which you will need to read my experiences not just with audiologist but about everything in my life being turned upside down. My home of 30 years, my garden that I made into a beautiful place starting with nothing but weeds, all the wildlife and songbirds I loved and fed, are gone because of a summer of violence that was condoned as “peaceful protests”, are ALL GONE. I will never again hear the song of the beautiful little wren that came faithfully in the month of May every year. My family is not close by like they once were. I am overcome with emotions and its hard to sort them all out while being criticized and told I need to OWN MY PROBLEMS.

ANOTHER KIND SOUL WHO THINKS POSTING HERE HONESTLY MAKES ME FAIR GAME.

I can’t just write one sentence so I need fillers to satisfy the automatic censor program so I’ll copy and repeat again.

ANOTHER KIND SOUL WHO THINKS POSTING HERE HONESTLY MAKES ME FAIR GAME. I didn’t come here to be FAIR GAME.

Thank you for coming here not with any helpful suggestion but to see if you can strike a very advantageous deal monetarily for yourself, profiting from someone else’s misfortune and sorrow.

You don’t sound like any “Rev” I would care for.