Hi Op, glad to see you’ve been sorted. GP staff here- PPs are correct in what they say. GP appts generally fall into two categories.
I want to choose which GP I see, or I’ve had this odd thing with my knee that’s been going on for a while type appointments. They’re generally a 2-4 week wait, because they aren’t considered urgent.
Then there are on the day/ urgent appts. Each surgery deals with them differently, so they might be Advanced Nurse Practitioner ( who can generally prescribe) they might be duty doctor (I.e. Doctor who is seeing anything urgent on the day) or a few available appointments with each clinician available on the day.
When you phone for an urgent thing, you need to make it clear that you need to be seen soon. So, acute things that are likely to get worse within a couple of days, for example, UTIs, chest infections and similar stuff. Anything which has been bothering you for ages so sore knee, back ache etc would generally be ok to wait a while.
Reception staff will often ask why you need the appointment, not because they have a nosy desire to know what’s going on in your life, but so that they can make an appointment with the right person. For example, diabetes checks are often dealt with by a specialist diabetes nurse, and seeing a GP for a check up wouldn’t be a good use of your, or their time. Similarly, if you have a weird skin rash, the doctor that sees most skin rashes would probably be more helpful, and likely to get you a quicker result than seeing the GP who looks and says hmmmmm, that’s odd, my colleague is really good with rashes, make an appointment to see them. If you’re having chest pain..... then waiting till the end of the day for a GP appt might not be sensible.