There's one guy at my company who goes off headset on the longer cruises which means i have to uncover one ear so i can hear him properly. Also means i miss alot of calls (and before you bash my hearing at my last medical i heard everything between 1-8 khz between 0 and 5 db) and it does my head in. The only problem is he's a captain and i'm just an FO. Also he's an extremely nice captain and very knowledgable and one of those guys i trust sitting next to me. So i guess i'll have to wait till i'm in the LHS and insist on headsets all the time (there are some exceptions, 3 hours on headset can hurt lets be fair)