A lost aid and insurance .. the rambling tale

[Guest guest]

I'm sure a bunch of you will empathize, and those that haven't been through

this will cringe at the prospect.

Ian lost a hearing aid this weekend. Not just lost it, but snapped the aid

off of the earhook. Not an easy task and yet, he managed it in his sleep!

He fell asleep on the futon watching movies with Dad while and I were

at a Girl Scout all-nighter at the local health club. He woke up on the couch

and headed for bed, pulling out his aids as he stumbled up the stairs. The

next morning he discovered one full aid and one lonely ear mold in the box.

We'd gotten in at 6:30 am, slept a bit, and then as I was pouring my

" morning " coffee (at about 11:30) I was informed about the missing aid. I

assumed

(from the initial story) that the aid+earhook+tube was MIA ... and we started

our standard search procedure. But no, the tube+hook had been found in the

futon and the little blue aid itself was what remained MIA. They'd already been

searching for 2 hours when I was told about it.

I was tired and annoyed when we started the search, but an hour later when I

found out that the earhook had been snapped off, I became furious. We've

been through searches before, so often that we have a standard search routine.

But never has an aid been broken, certainly never snapped apart.

I'm now sure that the little blue thing has sprouted legs and walked out of

the house. Since it snapped off, we thought perhaps it became a projectile in

the living room as it broke. I have searched places that it could not have

reached without its own private jet. I've given up hope of finding it. I think

it's gone on vacation to some far off island, along with a lot of single

socks and earbuds to an MP3 player.

This morning I called our insurance guy. They were not really thrilled about

the fact that it is lost someplace in the house. (At this point I'm doubting

if they'll cover the replacement cost) In order to process the claim they

need the serial numbers. I have them -- all four of them, but silly me didn't

mark the digital numbers as left and right.

The analogs were in Ian's ears at school, and the left digital is back for

trouble shooting since it STILL won't talk to the FM. I have no way to check

which serial number is which. So I called Genesis to get the info, hoping

they could easily look me up in the computer.

The lady was wonderful. She said she had all the info I needed, but there

was no need to place a claim with our homeowners company. We have a year of

loss/repair from Phonak since the aid is brand-spankin'-new. It's been years

since we've had new aids, so in the chaos I'd forgotten all about that! She

took

down the info about the aid's disappearance, said it'd take 2-3 days for the

replacement aid to reach them, and then a day or 2 to program it ... we can

expect the replacement in about a week. The $200 deductible is all we need to

pay.

Color me stunned and delighted. I don't have to write a letter or send them

the broken earhook. When my glasses broke, I had to give the company a piece

of the lens to prove it'd broken. Apparently some companies required a

notarized letter in order to process the claim, but not Phonak.

YAHOO! I am so-o-o-o-o-o relieved!!

So's Ian. In my ice-cold fury over this, I informed him that he was now 15

and would be held responsible for the cost of replacing the aid. We had just

purchased these new aids and this " accident " could have been very easily

avoided. He's thrilled to have only the $200 to worry about, and he personally

thanked the lady at Genesis for processing it all so quickly.

So my rambling tale has a somewhat happy ending.

Best to all -- Jill