West Kelowna isn't a service area for me. It's where I'm based. There's no clinic and no waiting room - the practice is entirely mobile and it runs out of West Kelowna, which means when someone here calls, I'm not planning a trip across the bridge. I'm already in town.

I'm Joe Wadden, a Registered Hearing Instrument Practitioner with thirty years in the trade. I bring the whole clinic to your kitchen table: the hearing test, the fitting, the adjustments and the follow-ups after.

Often the same day

Depending on how the week is running, I can usually see someone in West Kelowna the same day they call. Not a slot three weeks out. That's the part being local actually buys you, and it's the reason most people end up phoning me rather than waiting for a clinic appointment.

If you need something urgently - an aid that's stopped working before a family dinner, a sudden change in one ear - say so when you call and I'll tell you honestly whether I can get there today.

What an appointment at home looks like

I arrive with the audiometer, the fitting software and the tools, and we work at your table. A full hearing test takes about an hour.

Testing you at home is not a compromise - in some ways it's better. Your hearing aids have to work in your living room, with your television, at your dinner table, with the people you actually talk to. That's where we set them up, so what you hear in the appointment is what you get afterwards.

There's no showroom to walk through and nobody working on commission behind me.

Repairs and adjustments

I carry the common repair parts with me, so a lot of what goes wrong - wax filters, tubing, domes, a receiver that's given up - gets fixed at your table while I'm there.

If it needs a more expensive component, I'll tell you what it costs before I order anything. Those parts are paid for up front and then ordered in, and I come back and fit them.

I service most major brands, not only what I sell.

Cost and coverage

Pricing is in line with the big retailers, without the store behind it. I'm an authorized provider for Veterans Affairs Canada and I accept provincial income assistance.

You'll get the options and the prices in plain terms during the visit, and nothing is ordered until you say so.

Booking

Call 778-215-5261 between 8am and 6pm and you'll get me, not a call centre. Tell me what's going on and roughly where in West Kelowna you are, and I'll tell you the soonest I can be there.

Joe Wadden, RHIP - Valley Mobile Hearing Care, West Kelowna.