to wish the GP receptionists could manage to be civil

[emeraldgirl1]

I don't even ask for polite, or cheerful, though both would be nice.

Unfailingly they are snotty, difficult and generally behave as if dealing with patients is the most hideous task in the world.

I wouldn't moan except that I am never anything other than extremely polite (to the point of cravenness) and in addition the only thing I am ever asking them for is an appointment! I am not asking them for anything special! I accept humbly and politely that I can't see a doctor at any time vaguely convenient to me and am only ever politely and cheerfully asking them to locate the next available appointment. They ALL do it. I can only assume they must get some very difficult and angry patients and they feel the need to be on red alert? But I still don't think that has to translate to making an entirely reasonable patient feel like a latent criminal every time I call.

I am pregnant, so am ending up calling for more appointments (jabs etc) than usual. Dread it every time now.

Am sure there are many lovely receptionists out there but my surgery has hired all the stroppy and bitchy ones :(

Being shouted at is not an excuse. Try working in recruitment when you have to tell someone they havent been paid, and it is impossible to fix it immediately, or that there is still no work for them. To have them threaten to kill you, knowing that exactly that has only recently happened to someone down the road.

Being a GP receptionist is a very difficult job. They really are pushed to find appointments these days and people can be exceptionally demanding especially when they are scared or in pain. Unfortunately those who are rude take their toll on the receptionists and you would have to be a saint not to let it affect you! It is actually a really skilled and responsible job but receptionists generally don't have specific qualifications and are poorly paid. There is a lot to the job that people don't see and I think if you saw what people expect of them you would understand. The NHS can be a very frustrating place to work. Not to say there are some who probably are not great at their jobs and don't have the patience or empathy necessary for the job.

Oh, and receptionists also pay taxes btw..

Sorry, that sounds wanky. I just mean they are not the only workers shouted at or threatened, but seem to be the only ones who get away with being so rude

No *Salmotrutta" we've got some as well.

Probably helped by the Senior Partner having a very open door policy. He'll phone up to check how you are (as do the others) and call in on the way past.

Although he used to call me Mary because we turned up to register with him when they were fully booked and I was 37 weeks pregnant. Told me he'd let us register by the barn door Most of the time I appreciate his sense of humour.

However the receptionists at one local school...

beyond that's terrible.

My GP surgery is crap, it's really hard to get an appointment, but the receptionists are lovely. Always very straightforward on the phone which is all I want really, and always get a big smile and some chat for DS when we get there. The ones at my previous surgery were even better - very professional and organised. But then there seemed to be about 5 of them on at any one time, they wore uniforms and seemed to have a very clear working structure which I think helped a lot. I rang once about DS and they had no appointments (which the receptionist was very apologetic about) and when I tried to arrange for another day the receptionist said "You sound very worried, how old is your son?" When I told her he was 7 months she said "Oh poor thing, don't worry we'll squeeze him, I'll talk to the doctor and she'll call you back ok? Please don't worry I'm sure he's fine but we'll check him over anyway just to put your mind at rest." I could have cried she was so nice to me. And the doctor did ring back and squeezed me in later in the day. I miss that surgery :( DS was perfectly fine by the way, totally showed me up by being full of beans at the surgery, having been like a zombie the whole rest of the day .

It was :(
Being threatened daily isnt fun anyway, but then to have somethng like that happen was terrifying. But noone I worked with was ever rude. Private sector makes a difference, I guess?

in case anyone thought i was exaggerating

I dont understand it tbh, i would be as nice as possible to everyone I spoke to, to try to prevent anyone going off on one!!

At our surgery most receptionists are lovely, except for one, who is on a mad, zombie-crazed power trip and delights in making snide it downs and mentioning how much more important she is than you. She is the type that gets doctors receptionists a bad name. Complaints don't get anywhere as I think she stokes the doctors egos.

The receptionists at the doctor's surgery I am with are all lovely. I phoned today for an emergency appointment and was really politely asked if I would mind giving my symptoms so they could see if it was possible for a nurse to see me.

The problem I had was appropriate to be seen by the nurse but the appointment they offered clashed with the time my son is dropped off by taxi from his preschool (special placement so he comes home in a taxi with an escort). I explained this and she gave me an earlier appointment with a doctor. I was expecting to be told it was that appointment or nothing.

In my previous doctors you could be seen that day (if it was an emergency and you were very lucky) or in three weeks time with no options on what time or doctor. Several of the receptionist were quite bitchy, one in particular was horrible. I am very grateful to have moved to the one I am at now.

Some of the stories posted here are terrible. I don't know how anyone could be so nasty.

Cailin I remember a patient like your DS, the mum phoned up obviously at the end of her rope, I could hear the child screaming in the background so I squeezed said child in asap. GP's had a policy of 'sick child, appt same day'. Mum & child turned up and within 5 minutes child was playing and chatting happily, mum was mortified! She just kept saying sorry and "but he's been so poorly!" Made me chuckle..

All the receptionists at my GP surgery were like Satan's hench(wo)men, then I made a complaint about misdiagnosis (cancer repeatedly missed by various GP partners as well as local hospital) and they became angels overnight - I can almost always get a same day appointment with one of the less useless GP's. I am convinced they have me on some kind of "be nice" list.....

The receptionists at our old surgery were very unfriendly. And incredibly inefficient. They made so many administrative errors involving referrals and letters to hospitals that we changed practices after DS was born. I couldn't trust them with our baby's health after our experiences with them. They even entered his first name on their system wrong. I know anyone can make a mistake but the word they put in isn't even a name!

One of them even felt entitled to tell me DH's and my fertility test results when I phoned to speak to the doctor. She seemed put out when I asked to see the doctor to discuss them. Good job I did though because my result was in fact the opposite to what she told me .

Ours are lovely. Well one in particular stands out for me as the one I dealt with most when my dc were little and she was particularly lovely, the rest seem fine, never had a reason to complain.

I should add for balance that the receptionists at our current surgery are brilliant. All very friendly, approachable and efficient.

It's almost a shame that they provide an online booking service so I don't have to speak to them that much.

Mine are lovely, apart from one who looks at me weirdly, like she's smirking. Then when she's checking something on the computer she looks up and gives me shifty looks like I'm about to steal her pen on a chain. Strange woman.

When I was in university I did this job part time for a while.

My God I've the utmost respect for them. The amount of moany, boring, pains in the arse that constantly stream through the doors or bleating on the end of the phone. And yes, I realise sick people/pretend sick people aren't always in the best of moods. Jesus Christ it was hard going. Most of the time I could manage a fixed smile, but inwardly I was fantasising about strangling them with the phone cable.

'It's ok Doctor, they don't need to see you anymore because I have MURDERED them with my own bare hands'.

Quenhelle - same here. I had a referral letter to the local hospital that they did not bother to fax or post, despite repeated chasing. Dealing with NHS admin is like swimming through treacle. The number of things not sent, lost in the system or just downright not done is about 100 times higher than anywhere I have ever worked! I feel so sorry for people without the wherewithall to stay on top of it, because the admin staff mostly just don't give a toss.

Oh and then there was the 40 minute drive to a surgery that the receptionist assured me was open on Saturday....

Ours are gorgeous. Always smiling and cheerful, always get my kids seen the same day, brilliant at sorting my repeat scripts, and when I rang to see if I could get a prescription for the high strength painkillers I'd had for back pain when I had a flare up, they got the script printed, signed and faxed to my local chemist inside 15 minutes. Bloody angels. I make them fudge at Xmas.

Mine are very helpful. They can be a bit patronising sometimes but I guess that is just dealing with teh public and being asked stupid questions a lot (I too am seomtime a member of stupid question asking general public)

ALways polite though.

Can I add that you can check if your surgery has online booking for appointments. If they do, then they can give you some login details next time you go in and you can book future appointments online.
A caveat is that I have only just done this so I haven't tested yet how well it works - and obviously its no good for an emergency, but my work colleague was raving about how it massively improved her experience with getting appointments.

I'm quite lucky - mine are always at least civil. Often pleasant too.

I can always get an appointment on the same day.

However there is one arrogant archaic GP in the practice, so its swings and roundabouts!

I like the electronic arrival system as it means you can bypass them

In fairness ours arn't too bad though I did recently have one tell me.. when I said I didnt have a copy of the repeat prescription form as we have to hand it back the pharmacist... "thats not how it works you get a copy when you collect your prescriptions"...... Yes, and that has to be handed back to the pharmacist for a repeat..... "No that's not right. I tried to explain that Lloyds have a slightly different system to , but no I wrong despite using this chemist for years

All the ones in our surgery are awful. Once you've run the receptionist gauntlet, the doctors aren't much better either.

I think there must be a special training course

I tried to make an appointment for an eye test for my daughter. She needed a particular test that had to be done at the hospital for which she had to be referred by a doctor. After I politely explained what I needed, that it wasn't emergency-urgent but needed to be sooner rather than later as it was part of a SEN assessment and needed to be done before an OT appointment she told me to go to Specsavers and slammed the phone down