Salary Comparison for Audiologists

[zebra78244]

Hearing Aid Specialist (3 years experience, no longer working in field)

Big box store for AuD or HIS

Costco - 57k salary, ton of benefits
Sams Club- 70k salary, okay benefits
BJ's - 65k salary, okay benifits

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[Audiology-Med]

How do you people feel about your salaries now from when this forum was made, do you think audiologist pay has improved over the years, and also do you think you can live comfortably on how much you earn. Also if you were having an family would you think you would need twice the salary you have or would yours alone be enough to live reasonable life style and own a decent house and car. I'm a uk student and hoping to work in america or Canada when I'm older.

I was under the assumption that a salary over 60000 dollars was good for a single person.

 

[TheEarDoc]

How do you people feel about your salaries now from when this forum was made, do you think audiologist pay has improved over the years, and also do you think you can live comfortably on how much you earn. Also if you were having an family would you think you would need twice the salary you have or would yours alone be enough to live reasonable life style and own a decent house and car. I'm a uk student and hoping to work in america or Canada when I'm older.

I was under the assumption that a salary over 60000 dollars was good for a single person.

Well I jumped ship from the private sector to the public sector and joined the VA. Best decision I ever made. I wish I had joined the VA in my 4th year! The benefits are great, the pay is great (I received almost a 20k raise switching to the VA), and the schedule is wonderful.

I work 4 10's. Every holiday off. Good training opportunities from the vendors for CEU's.

I do not plan on leaving the VA. In fact I am thinking of applying for some chief positions when they open since I've always liked the administrative side of audiology and I pretty did it all at my previous job (from taking phone messages to ordering hearing aids to working on insurance contracts to setting clinic policies).

To answer your question about living comfortably. Well if I did not have 60k in student loan debt then I would be sitting very comfortably. If you work for the VA and do an income based repayment plan your loans are forgiven after 10 years or payments. So I have been trying to do the income based repayment plan, but with my wife's salary and my salary it's almost as much for the income base repayment plan as the 10 year repayment plan.

 

[dg2b]

Even still, I feel like there isn't much salary information out there, and the AAA/ASHA salary surveys seem to grossly overestimate salaries for new grads. Based on those surveys, I was expecting offers of 70K straight out of graduation, which wasn't the case. Here are some of the offers that my classmates and I have received on the east coast as new graduates:

ENT practices:
55K +commission (10-15% i think?), 2 weeks vacation
57-58K, no commission, 2 weeks vacation+6 personal days
60,500, $150 commission per HA, 3 weeks vacation+5 sick days
61K, 25% commission, 18 days PTO (includes vacation and sick)

Private practice:
53K +commission (could be up to 30K in commission, and potential to own practice in future), 2 weeks vacation

Hospital:
68K, no commission, unsure on vacation (someone with 2 years experience)

VA:
63K the first year and then 77K after that, excellent benefits

Holidays ranged from 7-10.5, and all included health insurance and a 401K/retirement plan

Hope this information can help other students or new grads to see some actual offers rather than averages in the surveys.

 

[tlacey2323]

A lot of great information here for someone considering audio. THanks all!!

 

[AuDacity]

This forum has been helpful, so paying it forward again:

~34.5k with approximately 4k in benefits (Partial coverage of health/dental/vision insurance, 400 hours of paid vacation+sick leave/annum, all federal holidays off) as a 4th year Intern at a VA placement in Texas.