impossible to book routine appointment
From well before the Covid Pandemic, Its always been a battle to book a routine non-urgent appointment to see GP. Instead of booking you an appointment on the days which suits you, the reception staff will pressure you to seek emergency appointments by calling them at 8am the next day with no gaurantee of getting a slot and then restrict you to discussing single medical issue at those emergency appointments. This makes life very difficult for working people as you cannot plan your days. They make it so difficult to book routine appointments that it almost puts you off even trying, resulting in many minor ilnesses going untreated and early signs of a serious desease left unchecked. It seems like all the reception staff are following a policy of forcing patients to call at 8am next day regardless of what the patient wants or needs. Usually upon patient's firm insistence and few minute of argument, the surgery will tell you they have no slots left for scheduled appointment and ask you to try your luck again the next day. I once called on 3 days in a row and got nothing! They claim all routine appointments get taken up quickely which begs the question if they are setting aside enough slots based on demand.