Hi all, I promised a follow up to this post:
healthunlocked.com/bta/post...
And the consensus was to avoid private and try the NHS. So, I took your advice, partially. I went to my GP for a referral and found out the wait time to be seen, in my area, was months. So, I found out that Specsavers takes NHS referrals in my area, so I did that and was seen in a few days. The audiologist was friendly, thorough and knowledgeable. I was fitted with NHS hearing aids same day and it has definitely improved my hearing (though I'm still getting adjusted to them) and somewhat lessened my T due to others sounds being heard that formerly were not. I'm grateful for the advice of who responded.
Tom