I hate

Broken Britain.

Specifically my GP.

The previous booking system was me and my OH both setting alarms and calling 15sec before lines opened, then pressing * to bypass the recording and hoping one of us got through to book a slot.

Now there is an online form that opens at 7.30am that you have to fill out as quickly as possible. You then get a text saying

A request has been made for.... at The X GP Surgery. Please contact the practice if you weren't expecting this.
We aim to respond to your request as soon as possible but please allow up to two working days. If you need more urgent help, please call 999.

Keep your phone to hand as we may contact you for further information, to book an appointment or to provide you with advice.
Thanks, X GP Surgery

I prefer the form system, it means a medical professional gets to triage the incoming requests and get people seen by the right person (not necessarily a GP/Doctor).

The old system would just have people booking directly with their GP for things that could easily be dealt with by a nurse or physician associate.

It improved my experience of booking with my local surgery.

We have this.

The form opens at 8.00am. By 8.01 they close access to the form as all slots are filled.

Tbf, if you need an appointment and you can get through, you almost always get an appointment that day or the day after. If not, you'll probably get a call on the day from a GP at least.

I see your point.

I called up and apparently have been assigned a triage slot for tomorrow.

It would be cool if it means you can now book non-urgent appointments, rather than an emergency appointment to then be allowed to unlock a future appointment.

At my GP in Hackney you'd call at 8am on the dot and the first thing they'd say is "is it just a cough?"

When you buy eyes cheese and it has no eyes

Having worked reception at multiple GP surgeries I'd have loved a form system to have been in place.

Our GP surgery physically opens before the phone lines, so you can get there early and book a slot in person if you really need one.

But not if you are more than a bit ill. When I had pneumonia and needed to see the GP a bit I wasn't well enough to hang around waiting rooms for long.

It's really helpful for the old people's home next door so they can be sure all the pensioners suck up all the slots

I had a horrible chest infection last year and couldn't get an appointment anywhere because it was too severe for a GP and not severe enough for A&E. My GP surgery advised me to call 111 and exaggerate my symptoms to get seen at a hospital. Bonkers that I basically had to pretend to have a heart attack to get some antibiotics and an inhaler.

Sounds like your GP abdicated their responsibilities. They hould be able to see you and book you in for a chest xray at the hsopital to see if you have pneumonia. That's what they did for me.

My daughter had a cough for two months…tried to get a GP, got a nurse practitioner who said it was a cold. A week later we try again as the situation didn’t improve. We got sent to a pharmacist who couldn’t prescribe antibiotics for coughs, get referred to GP who arranges a call back. GP calls back and says yeah bring her in the prescribes Antibiotics. Cough cleared after 5 days. 3 pointless interactions with NHS instead of one.

Wrestling with a tarpaulin in the wind

Yeah I mean this is what I'm having with my 3yo.

But at least between 111 and the Enhanced Pharmacy I know it's some sort of throat infection that needs antibiotics, but will be OK for another day.

I really do appreciate the fact that my GP surgery seems to be very good compared to a lot of people's experiences.

Haven't been registered with a dentist for 3 years however...

Ffs have just had it pointed out that being on the triage list may not necessarily mean my little one is seen tomorrow.

However, thank fuck my mum lives close enough to help with child care otherwise it would be another day off work.

Also thank fuck I have a job where I can take a sick day due to childcare without issue.

Currently hating the shops/bars on my street who are too dumb to use a cable to connect the card machine

Ooh sorry the Wi-Fi is being weird
Do you have cash? You can go outside on the street, get a data signal and then order your round and then come back on collect it!

My 20-something son had an small emergency op at the local hospital and was told to arrange to have the dressing changed at the nearest GP surgery. He’s lived here for 4 1/2 years but never needed NHS care so didn’t get round to registering locally. Between he an I, we had 9 conversations with NHS staff at 4 locations; firstly the local GP’s then the nearest A&E and two hospitals) all of which denied that it was their responsibility to do the (5 minute) job.
Fortunately the 9th person saw fit to mention he could have temporary registration at the GP and get the job done that way.
So, the moral of the story is, if you are down in Cornwall on holiday do remember to injure yourself on the first day because it will take 13 more days before you will find out what the f**k you can do about it.

If anything.

Fast food.

The time was when you went to the counter, ordered your food and then they brought it.

Now you order it on the display and stand around for 10 minutes whilst they do a load of takeaway orders.

It doesn't feel like progress

Unfortunately human nature is such that when we don’t feel like we’ll be judged by the person taking our order and can do it on a screen we order more, to the tune of 15-20%. As such the fast food companies have purposely reduced or removed staffed tills over time to chase those gains.

The delivery thing is a pain, a lot of the chains are redesigning restaurants with separate courier entrances, spinning up dark kitchens etc but those redesigns always take a few years to roll through all the restaurants.

Signed, an ex-fast food company IT drone

Order on the app from outside the restaurant, you'll get your food waaaaay faster. I don't eat it anymore* but have to take clients every week so have learnt the hard way.

I was at a Carl's Jr with a client last year, ordered at the counter and had to wait 35mins for food. The whole time there was a procession of Drive-Thru customers and Deliveroo guys picking up food, lesson learned.

* I am recovering from an addiction to Carl's Jr double cheeseburgers, they are incredible.

This is fascinating, thanks

You're welcome! It's a funny old world when the focus and investment has shifted from operations (how quickly and accurately can you turn orders around), to IT and Digital. In part this is because a lot of our restaurants were pretty much at capacity in terms of the number of people per hour you could get through the eat-in and drive-thru channels, so delivery and mobile orders were the only way for them to grow. The downside being the experience aggi describes above.

People's loyalty to delivery platforms is another funny one, rolling out delivery we found that every time you added another provider, you got pretty much pure additive custom. If someone was a Deliveroo person rather than an Uber person they just wouldn't bother ordering from us until we partnered with Deliveroo and even if Deliveroo ran an offer on our food, Uber people would stick with Uber.

Dirty lazy bastards

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