Lost, damaged or unwanted hearing aids

Hearing aids are issued on loan from the NHS and are valuable property. Please look after them and follow any maintenance advice you have been given by your audiologist.

If you lose or damage the hearing aid through negligence, we may charge you per hearing aid and an invoice will be issued. Examples of negligence can be found below. We will only issue your replacement hearing aid once the invoice has been paid.

Payment is taken by the General Office (please see your invoice for further details), we do not accept payment direct to the Audiology Department.

There are exemptions to being charged for lost or damaged hearing aids. Please read the information below to check whether you are exempt.

Hearing aid charge exemptions and examples of hearing aid neglect

Exclusion criteria

Those patients who meet one of the criteria outlined below will be exempt from paying and will have their hearing aid replaced free of charge:

Children and young people under the age of 18
Hospital inpatients or Patients in Care Home setting (a hearing aid or other instrument lost or damaged as a result of being a hospital inpatient or Care Home may be charged to the hospital ward/Care Home)
Patients with a terminal illness
Patients with developmental delay, dementia, learning difficulties or those cared for under the mental capacity act
Patients in receipt of the following: War Pension, Universal Credit and PIP – Proof of these is required.
Patients registered as sight impaired or severely sight impaired
Patients who have lost/damaged their hearing aid in a road traffic accident, burglary, mugging or house fire (police incident number required)
Hearing aids more than five years old (in this case a reassessment is indicated)

This is at the discretion of the Audiology Manager.

Once payment has been received by the General Office, Audiology is contacted with the receipt number

Upon contact from the General Office, the Audiology department will program the replacement hearing aid(s).

Please note that timescales will depend upon a variety of factors. These might include waiting for new ear moulds to be processed (this can take up to 6 weeks), awaiting the arrival of specialist hearing aids if required or time taken for the hospital to process their post and for Royal Mail to deliver it.

Found aids

If a lost hearing aid(s) has been paid for and is subsequently found within 1 month of payment, patients are entitled to a refund at the discretion of the Head of Department.

If a lost aid is reported to the Audiology department as found, the Head of Department will review the case and authorise a refund if appropriate.
- Please note if a replacement aid has been issued in the meantime, this will need to be returned if a refund is requested.
General Office is then contacted to process the refund.
The finance department will issue the refund using the same method that was originally used to pay for the aid(s). The only exception will be if the aid was paid for by cash; the refund will be either by cheque or bank transfer (BACS) if bank details are provided.
- Please note that timescales will vary depending on a variety of factors. Payments are only made once a week. Cheques are sent out by second class post, so will therefore take longer than a BACS payment.

Examples of neglect

Charges will still apply if a patient has damaged their hearing aid through neglect. Examples of neglect would be:

exposure to excessive moisture from showers, baths or swimming
damage from contact with domestic appliances such as washing machines, microwaves or ovens
tampering by patient or carer such as gluing parts of the hearing aid together or inserting the battery incorrectly
marks of damage through neglect or poor storage such as rust, grime, melted casing and teeth marks
poor and inappropriate cleaning of hearing aid or mould that causes irreparable damage