Poor customer service

We have an awesome new pediatrician, thanks to the recommendation of my friend TallGirl, and I have no intention of changing, but let's just say I have a few comments on their customer service.

I recently took Henry to his 15-month checkup, and he got his first flu shot. Since it's his first ever (he was too young for one last fall), he needs a second shot a month after the first one. At the front desk, I tried to make his appt for his second shot.

"Oh, you'll have to talk to Diane to do that. I can't make flu shot appointments, just ones for physicals," I was told by the woman at the front desk. Um, OK. I don't know who Diane is, but I know flu shots are their own animal, having experienced at our old pediatrician's office the horror of "flu shot days," which were ill-timed days in November on which your child could get scheduled for a flu shot. Only on these inconvenient days were the shots administered, and they were always behind schedule so you'd sit there for ages waiting for your 30-second visit with the nurse.

I figured I'd wait until I got home and then call the mysterious Diane, who meanwhile was probably sitting in an office less than 30 feet from me. Whatever.

So I tried to make Henry's 18-month appointment and Padraic's 4-year appointment for the same day in late January to avoid having to come back twice.

Woman at the desk: "What was the date of Padraic's last physical?"

Me: "I'm not sure of the exact date, but it was within the week of his birthday, so anything after January 19 would be fine."

Woman: "We need to confirm the actual date because the insurance will not pay if the appointment happens less than 12 months from his previous one."

Me: "I know that, and it's fine. If we shoot for the last week of January, we'll be fine."

Woman: "I can't do that without knowing for sure it'll be more than 12 months from his previous physical. You don't remember the date?"

Me (who can hardly remember to put shoes on before leaving the house): "No, but it's in his medical records that we transferred over here so it'd be easy to look it up in his file."

Woman: "Oh, we can't look that up for you. You'll have to call your insurance company, find out the date, and then let us know. Now what date would you like for Henry's next appointment?"

Me (incredulous): "Forget it. I don't want to have to come back twice for two physicals that could be done at once. I'll just have to call some other time and set up the appointments."

I admit I left somewhat in a huff. I didn't expect someone to have looked up Padraic's last dr's appointment date for me that second, but if his file is in the room behind the front desk (probably right near the elusive Diane, too) and if someone was going to have to refile Henry's medical records since he'd just had an appointment, would it really have been that difficult for someone to open Padraic's folder, stare at the sheet of paper from his last appointment, and note the date? I didn't think that was too much to ask, and neither did my insurance company. I called them to find out the date, and they thought I was crazy. They asked me why I didn't just have the dr's office look it up in his file. Gee, I wish I'd thought of that.

Once I had the date in hand, I called the office to make the appointments. First, I figured I'd make the flu shot appointments since they are needed sooner. The phone menu gave no option for how to reach Diane, so I chose the option for the appointment secretary. When I reached her, I told her I'd like to talk to Diane about flu shot appts. She told me I'd have to call back to the same number I'd just called, but this time wait on hold to talk to the sick nurse. Then tell the sick nurse that I need to talk to Diane. WTF? I was already on the phone with someone at the office, and I bet she was sitting in the same room as the unreachable Diane, and she wouldn't just transfer me herself?! Are you kidding me?

Doesn't it make more sense to have an appointment secretary, who probably is on each call for only 1-2 minutes, make a call transfer instead of having someone wait on hold with the sick nurse, whose conversations about symptoms and such run much longer each? I tried to get transferred without having to call back. No dice. I called the sick nurse's number again and got a dial tone. Fuck it. I will call back another day when I don't feel like wringing their necks anymore.

Is it too much to ask to streamline your customer service so people can make the appointments they need w/o waiting on hold for someone they don't really need to talk to? How about just giving Diane her own number in the phone menu so people can reach her directly? And how about asking your office staff to handle simple requests like looking up something in a patient's medical record. That's what the records are kept for, right? So in the future someone can look back and find information about something that was done? If I gave people the run-around like this at work, I'd be taken to task for it. Don't think I won't be mentioning it to the dr the next time we actually are able to make an appointment via this labyrinthine system.