Surgery says I've missed my phone appointment but I have no missed calls

[smokingcarriageonly]

I guess this is half frustrated venting and half asking for suggestions for how I can resolve this.

GP was supposed to ring after 2 today. I checked settings and volume and had the phone next to me or in my pocket at home all afternoon. Dh rang mid afternoon and phone rang as normal.

No call from the surgery by 5:30 so I rang to double check the appointment and reception said yes, GP will ring by 6. I rang again before they closed at 6:30 and they said GP had rung me twice and I'd missed the appointment and would have to reschedule.

Wouldn't I have two missed calls though? I'm trying to work out what happened and how to resolve it considering they're only booking phone appointments now and I need my repeat prescription which they won't issue without an appointment.

They've let me down in the past (they texted me to cancel a string of appointments then said I'd failed to attend the appointments they cancelled) so I'm wary of how their systems work. I've never missed an appointment.

Check that your phone hasn't rejected them as spam calls. Sometimes happens if they ring from 0800, 0345, etc numbers. Double check they are ringing the correct number for you too

Do you have withheld numbers blocked? This happened to my mum and it was because of that.

Telephone appointments are dreadful. I've missed so many. I can't answer my phone during the day (teacher). I've asked for them at 8am & they've phoned at 11 before now. I went into the doctor once & asked if I could please not have any phone appointments. They said fine, then next line I need a review, they text & say a phone appointment has been made for me. 😡

Thanks. Yes sorry I did ask them to read the number back to me and it was correct.

I can only see all calls or missed calls and in settings > phone 'silence unknown callers' is off. Will google and have a closer look, see if there's somewhere else I need to look.

I was using a different SIM while abroad and had loads of spammy calls (helpfully labelled Scam Likely) all of which rang as normal unless DND was on.

Possibly they rang at the same time as you were ringing the surgery or your DH was ringing you?

Perhaps your signal dropped out?

Funny enough I had the same problem with my mum's phone (though we've never managed to completely solve it). I had checked this before the appointment and 'silence unknown callers' is off.

Wouldn't I still have a missed call? Or would it just reject the call without a trace?

Oh god, aren't they just? I don't understand how it's just tough luck for you, it seems like there should be a way to opt out.

My phone occasionally just doesn't take a call. I've actually been holding my phone when it's popped up with a missed call. I don't really know why.

Dh just rang me using 141 and it rang normally (says No Caller ID) and showed up as a missed call.

It's not impossible that GP was calling at exactly the same time I was ringing them or that the signal dropped but it seems unlikely to have happened both times. If they insist on phone appointments there needs to be leeway for the fact that other people might ring you during the four hour period you're expecting a call from the GP.

I have had this with the medication review person. I do not believe he has rung and uses the no one answered as an excuse. They are busy - get behind and are under staffed and saying no one answered sounds plausible but I do not believe my phone works and rings for every other number apart from that one - on almost every occasion I have an app.

After 2 doesn't even sound like an appointment. Not your main point, but it's bloody annoying that they think they can ring you when convenient for them, without checking you're available to discuss something confidential!

I had a referral. Telephone appt never happened, they wrote to say that was it. Referral made by GP again, no call, just a letter again binning me off for not taking the call.

So I called them, took half an hour to get my number corrected. They kept saying, the number ending in 123. Yes, but it's the other numbers you've got wrong!!!

Bloody hard work. I hate it when people can't do their jobs properly.

A mobile will always show if there’s a missed call even if you’re on another call.
they’re fobbing you off

I had a missed call and voicemail from my DC’s school once that didn’t show up on my phone notifications at all.

No missed call notification, no missed calls showing on the recent bit on the calls log, no voicemail notification. I was oblivious to the whole thing until I went to school at the usual time and the teacher started talking about how DC had been fine for the rest of the day after his accident.

I was convinced at first that the office must have rang the wrong number because of the lack of notifications of any sort on my phone, but when I rang my voicemail (after double checking my contact details with the school office) there was in fact a voicemail message from the school from earlier that day.

But because there wasn’t any indication that anyone had tried to call or had left a message, I hadn’t known to check.

I’ve no idea how common that sort of thing is though.

But anyway, phone appointments for doctors can be a right PITA. Even when I’ve been given an actual appointment time they rarely ring anywhere near the time they say they’re going to.

If you're absolutely sure then pursue this . I was shocked myself when I found out Dr's absolutely tell fibs . I was having surgery and was having an appointment with a nurse . She said at your last appointment with the GP your blood pressure was taken , yes? I just looked at her and said no he didn't take it .
Nurse said I've got it written here , I said I can guarantee I never had my blood pressure taken . Nurse didn't look surprised and just said someone's been telling fibs .

That's not actually necessarily true - there are occasional faults where a phone won't ring and the call gets sent straight to voicemail.
The person being called won't know they've missed a call unless the caller leaves a voicemail.

@smokingcarriageonly Which network are you on and what phone do you have? Vodafone, Three, EE/BT are all switching off their 3G networks at the moment - does your phone definitely use 4G for voice calls?

They might not be fobbing you off. I phone people for medication reviews and I’ve had people not answer the phone who have then called the surgery to say they had no missed calls, my colleagues have too.
I always phone people at least twice, more if time allows. I would never not call a patient but pretend I had, that would be very unprofessional.

Could he have just dialled the wrong number?