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I'm done with Costco

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What comes to mind is that happiness has been proven to be max 50% biological and max 50% controllable. If you are unfortunate and didn’t inherit any biological happiness genetics, you have to work very hard to be happy, because at best you can only be 50% happy. If you inherited the max biological happiness but choose to live unhappily, you will also be only 50% happy.

@aquanomics While I agree with your sentiment, perhaps we could be a little more tolerant of @user783 We all have times where we may misinterpret one experience and extrapolate it onto all experiences.

@Raudrive @user783 Hmmmm, I just resaw (new word!) your post. It looks like OP fled the forum for whatever reason.

I have to assume that the “whistling” is a new issue as you have had the aids for 3 years. And I would guess that the needs to be replaced. You could make another appointment with the specialist that you had success with before, or any specialist other than the one you had the bad experience with. Sure you can abandon Costco and start over with another fitter with a different product and your experience could easily be worse.

The Costo Hearing Center model is a phenomenal value. I was lucky to have found an excellent audiologist at my local Costco back when I got the KS6 - then the KS10. She moved out of town and now with the Sennheiser Sonite Rise I am deaing with her protoge’ working to tune these up to improve on the KS10. If you don’t have a good team at your local Costco and there isn’t another store nearby, you are left with the rest of the marketplace.

You comment that you were early for your appointment and the specialist was late, which suggests that punctuality is a priority for you.

Yet, you seem to have no thought that if you take the specialist’s time for a 30 minute fitting, which was not part of what your appointment was about, you would make the fitter seriously late for their next appointment, and the person after that, and the person after that and… Would it really have been that hard to understand Costco’s point of view and make a separate appointment for a new fitting? I like Costco’s point of view on this - treat the customers behind you with respect and lose a sale.

In reply to @DonsHA

I would say there are not many hearing aid fitters that have a doctorate of audiology at Costco.

However, that’s not really important unless you have insurance that requires a prescription from a doctor of audiology, or the Costco hearing aid fitter says they can’t help you with your specific hearing loss.

Personally, I think there is too much degree creep in audiology and physical therapy.

In reply to @tenkan

@tenkan said:

This doesn’t mean much, are you saying Costco is inferior in some way?

I think finding a good audi or hearing aid specialist is a crap shoot. Once you find one, they’re invaluable. I’m a musician, and finding a tech who understands the parameters required for performing musicians is rare indeed. costco tends to have a revolving door of techs at any site. I don’t want to have to detail the entire rationale as to why my aids are set up the way they are on my musician program to a newbie who has no clue, each time I go in for an adjustment. they’re likely to screw up the whole program. Same goes for other programs as well. I’m lucky to have a nearby shop with a stable staff that knows my history, and has my records on file. We have a technical rapport. Yes, I pay more initially for my HA’s, but they’re programmed correctly for my needs when trying different models and after my final purchase. and, appointments can happen quickly. Daily! in terms of cleaning and other minor issues. I suggest that this is a model that other independent providers follow to compete with Costco.

@jeffrey said:

I think finding a good audi or hearing aid specialist is a crap shoot. Once you find one, they’re invaluable

Audis and HAPs, like the ones at Costco, are just like the people in any other profession. Twenty percent are really good, sixty percent are average and twenty percent need to find a new line of work.

I know 12 or so at Costco that are categorized into simple fitting adjustments, problem solvers, extremely knowledgeable with Target and the ones to avoid at all costs. Unfortunately, one of the problem solvers left a couple of years ago, and one of the knowledgeable ones on Target transferred stores. I grieved.

My list mostly came the hard way!

With my Sphere i90s, I don’t go to Costco anymore, but my wife still does.

I’m seeing a new audiologist. Dr. of Audiology.

Told her about my left ear distortion.

Said she never heard of it. I’ve never had one audiologist who knew what I was talking about.

Edit: Including one who had been an audiologist for 25 years.

Costco tech’s are trained what to look for to reflect the situation at the time, it’s called an otoscope, a quick look for wax blockage/ infection issues, obviously they have no idea why/how like the Audiologist does.

If you go to the dentist for cleaning and they find a cavity or they decide you need a crown they can’t do it while you’re sitting there there’s not enough time and schedule.

This is true and the Audiologist/doctors can be like this, sometimes it just takes time to sort through what’s required.

I know a lot of the staff in Costco hearing aid centers are , but I also know the woman I see there is an audiologist and that she’s been there since the first time I visited for a hearing test which was in the time of KS6’s, at a guess approaching 10 years ago. We’ve chatted about our lives a little, and she once told me she started out working in a private practice and “It made me feel like a used car salesman.” She prefers Costco’s salaried, non-commission terms of employment.

We all get to choose what fits us best. The last time I got aids they were off eBay because Costco didn’t have the Sennheisers yet and I wanted Phonak-based aids badly enough to do that. But I expect to be back at Costco again next time.

In reply to @Neville

Costco is sliding down the list of providers for me. Refusal to retest when I was having difficulties understanding speech, even in mostly quiet surroundings. I think I bought 5 pairs of hearing aids for my late mother. One of the counter people in Dallas decided I was trying to have her aids tuned to my hearing loss. From then on, Costco became less than useless. Since my mother’s death I have no need to deal with their hearing aid department. I have switched over to my self programmed Oticon Real 1s.

I am considering trying the Oticon Intent 1 since they are covered by my Truehearing benefit.

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