You can certainly rent/hire pumps to mothers, and so so ethically.

Becoming a pump rental station, however, means you are now a *small
business* and must be able to deal with all the headaches any commercial
enterprise may have:  do you have the money to acquire the customary
"minimum" number of units required by the pump company?  take credit cards?
how to collect bad debts?  what if mom never returns the pump?  what about
the mom who wants you to meet the eBay price, which is half of what you
charge?  have you budgeted time to send out bills and track receipts?  how
will you track which pumps are in/which are out?  who cleans and tests the
pumps upon their return?   Where do you store all the Stuff (pumps, kits,
special flange sizes, etc.  Will you sell pumps too, or just rent
hospital-grade pumps? And on and on.

I am small private practitioner, and I *stopped* renting pumps precisely
because these business-related issues were such a pain in the neck.  I
originally opened the rental business thinking it would be the gateway for
all sorts of wonderful, lucrative lactation consults ... and I literally
never got ONE consult out of a pump rental contact.

One suggestion is to find someone who already has an established pump rental
business, and see if they want you to be a "sub-station" for them.  They do
the majority of accounting paperwork And take on the responsibilities
mentioned above; you serve as a convenient outlet for their business, and
make a little money to boot.  Note that most such arrangements have a
perfectly legal and not unusual  "anti compete" clause (meaning you can't
quit your sub-station business on Monday, having learned the ropes on your
boss's dime and your boss's time, and open your own competing station on
Tuesday).

I sound like I am full of sour grapes ... I truly am not.  Several of my
colleagues have thriving pump rental businesses, and love being able to
offer this service, because most moms who need pumps *really* need pumps
here in the USA (where c-sections and late-pre-term babies seem like the
norm these days, not the exception).  It just wasn't the right fit for the
practice size I want right now.

--
Liz Brooks JD IBCLC
Wyndmoor, PA, USA

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