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Six years of NHS hearing aids. I've changed the batteries 312 times. I worked it out on a Sunday evening with a calculator and had to sit down. I'm Roy. 74. Retired electrician from Wakefield. Every four days. Size 312. Tiny copper discs in child-resistant packaging that I have to attack with scissors because my fingers aren't what they were. Monday morning, over the bathroom sink, both ears. Four days later, again. I have a drawer in the kitchen. Margaret calls it the battery drawer. Forty empty battery cards in various states of destruction. Some neatly punched. Some ripped open in frustration because the packaging is designed for younger hands than mine. I keep spares in my wallet. Have done for three years, since the time my left ear went dead at my grandson's school concert. Sat there nodding along to music I couldn't hear. Didn't want to make a scene. Now I carry them everywhere. Wallet, jacket pocket, glovebox of the car. Margaret found a pack in my coat at Christmas and said nothing. Just put them back. She knows. I worked it out. £120 a year. Over six years, the better part of £800. Just in batteries. For hearing aids that were supposed to be free. Seven hundred and something pounds. And that's not counting the four hospital trips a year for tube changes, or the whistling every time I pick up the phone, or the two beige hooks on my ears that Dave at bowls calls "satellite dishes." But they were free. And you don't complain about free. Last month at the bowls club, Derek sat down with a pint. "Got rid of my NHS ones," he said. "What do you mean got rid of them?" "Found something better. 149 quid." "149? What is it, Amazon rubbish? Terry's brother wasted forty quid on that stuff." "No, proper hearing aids. Not amplifiers. My daughter showed me an article. Retired NHS audiologist tested five brands. These came out comparable to the Boots and Specsavers ones. Same components. Just no shop, no markup." "Any good?" "Roy, I haven't touched a battery in two months. Rechargeable. And no whistling. None. I've been wearing them sat here for an hour and you didn't even notice." He was right. Hadn't noticed. "Who makes them?" "Bloke called David Taylor. His dad was like us, apparently. Seventy-odd, couldn't afford Boots on his pension, wouldn't wait a year and a half for NHS. Just sat there getting worse. Taylor watched it happen and thought: this is bollocks. The actual technology costs nothing compared to what they charge. Why can't you just buy the hearing aid without paying for the fancy shop and the salesman's commission?" "So he set up his own?" "Since 2025 you apparently can sell hearing aids direct in this country. Don't need a clinic. Taylor was one of the first to do it. Warehouse in Stoke-on-Trent. Same Knowles components as Boots. No shop, no commission, no markup. That's the £149." "And your daughter found this?" "She found the article. The audiologist one. I'll send it over. Read it yourself, make up your own mind." That evening I read it. Dr. Margaret Ellis. Thirty years fitting hearing aids, NHS and private. Tested five brands side by side. Real patients. What she said about NHS aids stung a bit. Reliable, she said. Solid basic technology. But basic is the word. One channel processing. Everything amplified the same — voices, traffic, the fridge, the lot. Then she broke down what Boots and Specsavers actually charge for. The hearing aid itself — receiver, chip, microphone — costs the manufacturer maybe £80 to £100. The rest of that £3,000? The shop. The staff. The commission. The area manager. The television adverts. You're not paying £3,000 for a hearing aid. You're paying £3,000 for the privilege of buying it in a nice chair. That made sense to me. I'm an electrician. Forty years of quoting jobs. I know what components cost and I know what markup looks like. Margaret read it over my shoulder. "It's less than what you've spent on batteries. Just try them." She wasn't wrong. £149 versus £800 in batteries. For free hearing aids. Ordered them that night. 45-day trial at home. If they're rubbish, send them back for a full refund. Three days later. Small box. Five ear tip sizes. Charging case — proper little case, not a bag of button batteries and a prayer. Put them in. Sat in the kitchen. First thing I noticed: the fridge. I could hear it humming. But quietly. In the background. With my NHS aids the fridge is the same volume as Margaret talking. With these, the fridge stayed in the background and Margaret was clear. Separate. Different volumes for different sounds. Six years of NHS aids and I didn't know hearing aids could do that. "Roy, do you want tea?" She was in the garden. Door closed. "Yes please." She came inside. "Did you just hear me from out there?" "Clear as day." "You daft sod. Why didn't you do this years ago?" Seven weeks now. NHS aids in the bedside drawer. Battery drawer still there. Margaret suggested clearing it out. I said leave it a bit longer. I want to remember what six years of managing something unnecessary actually looks like before I bin the lot. That's the thing nobody tells you about NHS aids. I thought that was just how hearing aids worked. Everything a bit loud and flat. Batteries every four days. Whistling on the phone. Two beige hooks that everyone can see. I didn't know they could separate voices from background noise. I didn't know they could be rechargeable. I didn't know they could be small enough that your mate sits next to you for an hour and doesn't notice. I thought what I had was as good as it gets. Turns out what I had was as good as free gets. Derek. Me. Big Dave from bowls. Malcolm got a pair last week after his NHS battery died mid-round. Four of us now. Four blokes who spent years fumbling with batteries because we thought free was the best we'd get. £149 with a two-year guaranteed lifespan. That's 20p a day. Twenty pence. Less than what I was spending on batteries alone. Except now I don't need batteries, don't need to fiddle over the sink every Monday, don't need to carry spares in my wallet, and don't need to spend half a morning at the hospital every six months for a tube change. Six years of free NHS aids cost me £800 in batteries. 20p a day turns out to be the better deal. The article Derek's daughter found is here: www.healthylivingdigest.news/pages/healthy-living-digest-we-tested-the-actual-cost-of-5-top-hearing-aids-sh Retired NHS audiologist. Tested five brands. Real patients. Listed every brand, every price, every result. Read it yourself. Make up your own mind. If you do want to try Smart Hearing: www.trysmarthearing.com/products/smart-hearing-aids Still £149 last time I checked. 45-day trial at home and if they don't work for you, just send them back for a full refund. Roy Patterson, 74, Wakefield 312 battery changes. £800 in copper discs. Turns out 20p per day was the answer all along. P.S. Derek won't stop going on about it. Every time someone at bowls mentions hearing, he says "get rid of your NHS ones, mate." Margaret says he's worse than when he got the caravan.