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Costco has stopped carrying Phonak hearing aids

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I genuinely don’t know what to say.

I guess all I can say is I hope Costco figures out what they’re going to do moving forward with their KS11’s.

In reply to @SpudGunner

After Ed Snowden’s revelations from a few years back, you never can tell I guess. As a Government employee whose organisation is doubling down on security, I wonder if I’ll be asked to airplane mode my .

At my appointment, the audio asked if I was seeing any issues with recharging and then said there was a parting of ways. Costco audios had only found out a few days previously. Poster for Kirkland HAs up, no Phonak literature and neither Brio nor KS10 in the display case.

My audio did confirm spares are not an issue so aftercare is not affected.

Edited
@garethjwells said:

My audio did confirm spares are not an issue so aftercare is not affected.

How long do they provide “aftercare”? I have 4 year old KS8s and recently asked about having my 2 year old receivers replaced. I was told that since they are not a current model, they cannot order parts, If they did not have them in stock, they would nedd to send the aids to Rexton foe “warranty” repair" They are past the 3 year warranty though.

Since manufacturers state they design hearing aids to last from 4 to 7 years, only supporting current models outside of warranty seems very shortsighted.

For sure, I had read here that many people would tell Costco the battery life on their rechargeable was noticeably less at around 2.5 years or so…and basically receive like for like replacement HAs. Giving you a decent shot at another 3 years of trouble free use.

I had my KS8s in for service at 3 years just before warranty expired. Now, at 4 years, I am told they can no longer order receivers,

Just to verify, I plan on verifying that from the Costco where I bought my .

Edited

Well I guess we’re all left with nothing but speculation here, and there’s certainly been a lot of it offered, so how could it hurt to offer mine?

This parting of the ways might be due to a combination of effects. Yes, there are charging issues. (In my ‘one data point’ experience they seem to be easy to solve, see my post here.) Maybe to satisfy Costco’s needs for a super low-low price, Sonova did one monster production run, which makes any design changes or “oops” fixes hard (costly) to achieve.

And maybe something entirely unrelated - Sonova has provided two models now for Costco KS . In both cases it was known that they were Phonak knock-offs. If I was an audiologist and losing business to Costco because of that (just as my audiologist lost me when I discovered the KS10s were $4000 cheaper than what she was charging), I could maybe put up with that for 18 months, stay with the program and plan on normalcy to return when the knock-off was no longer available. But two models in a row? And maybe a third? Now I’m getting mad, and casting about for a different lead brand to carry in my practice. Maybe I’m writing Sonova and letting them know in no uncertain terms what I think of them polluting the brand that has become the bread-and-butter (and maybe a nice home and other luxuries) for me and my practice.

Maybe Sonova would take that to heart and reconsider how they market their products?

Frankly, I think the HA industry business model stinks. It is manipulation of a market for the profit of a few at the expense of many. As others have said, I think it will come around to bite them. The market WILL adjust.

EDIT:
Just to be clear, I have no issue with audiologists. I think they’re stuck with the industry business model, and many would be happy to charge fee-for-service, along with providing a selection of products at a reasonable price. It would seem that front-loading all the margins for running your practice into the sale of the devices heavily skews how the audi must do their job, and often not in a good way.

Bottom line, this is a business decision made in a marketplace with a rapidly changing technology and uncertain supply chain. As a life long electronics engineer, I never really know why descisions are made at the top level management. Even if you got a direct statement from the CEOs, you would only get the answers they want you to hear.

In reply to @josephtwomey

In my personal experience, degreed audiologists may be useful for theoretical design but, many times, I have had better fitting experiences with a trained .

A couple of my worst fitting experiences were from audiologists. One of my worst testing experiences was from an MD who teaches audiologists. He even admitted to not fitting digital aids, but directing the fitting to one of his audiologist employees, After his test he actually tested me with analog aids thatm, in my short experience, worked better than the Phonaks fitted by his audiologist.

In reply to @josephtwomey

Interesting. Raises some red flags to me though. Resound doesn’t make cochlear implants. Cochlear does and they share ancillary equipment, but they’re distinctly different companies. Is this person real, or just sloppy?

@ctromley Well-argued and plausible. I wonder though how many people as a percentage of the hearing aid using population actually know that KS10 and Paradise aids are so similar.

If the KS11 is built by some other company, people will still go to Costco, and Sonova’s audiologists are no better off.

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