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Costco now providing travel charger with Philips?

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Good morning,

Looking at the Costco site I see that rather than the regular charger their Phillips hearing aids now come with the travel charger. Any idea why the change?

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I think for Oticon aids, you get the choice of one or the other for the same price. The Smart Charger is convenient with its built-in battery but that can also complicate its reliability aspect if not managed properly.

Maybe Costco just presumes that most people would want the Smart Charger so they just switch to it now that it’s available on the Phillips platform. You should try to ask them whether there’d be a choice for one over the other.

I asked Costco this morning. It seems the portable charger is the only charger offered with the Phillips now, I was told as maybe Phillips thought it would give consumers more value for their money.

OK thanks for the clarification. I agree that the Smart Charger is probably the more desired option for most people thanks to its portability. Even if you don’t manage the built-in battery and the battery goes bad prematurely, you can probably still plug it in to charge afterward just like the desktop charger anyway. You’ll just end up losing the portability function but you won’t lose the charging function by plugging it in.

I picked up a pair of 9040’s last week and did receive the Charger Plus with them. I also have a pair of 9030’s, with the usb desk charger, so now I have both. :call_me_hand:

At home probably the desktop usb, traveling I will take the charger plus. It is nice to have a choice, if I only had one, I’d prefer the charger plus.
Interestingly, in the manual for the charger plus, they state that it will act as a dryer too?

My hearing aids came with the standard charger , I asked if they’d swap it out for me being less than the 180 days and they said no and not worth to me the $200 cost to purchase the plus. Oh well, not the worst thing…I do hear so much better with the Phillips than I did with my 7-8 year old Kirklands.

Yeah, I wouldn’t stress over it and I wouldn’t pay another $200 for it either. I used the desktop usb charger for the last 2 years and never had an issue charging, whether at home, in a hotel, trailer or truck, there’s usb ports everywhere you look these days.

In reply to @damaltor

@damaltor said:

Interestingly, in the manual for the charger plus, they state that it will act as a dryer too?

That’s just because the Plus has the lid to enclosed the aids inside. So the inductive heat generated is trapped inside the enclosure, giving it the side benefit of doing the drying as well. But it’s not really a bonafide dryer specifically designed with just drying in mind. A bonafide dryer should have a fan as well to vent out the humid air, or at least sufficient heat to enable the convection circulation of the humid air to evaporate in an open case design.

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