AIBU ... to ask you to cancel your vax appointment if you don't need it

[BruceAndNosh]

Really frustrating!

I was volunteering at vax centre yesterday, all appointments.
Very busy as one vaccinator was off sick.

I was checking names off as people arrived among other duties.
The early appointments were boosters but late morning we had a couple of dozen 2nd doses booked in, and over half of them didn't turn up!
I assume that they a) forgot date of 2nd dose when they booked their 1st one 6 months before or b) had brought forward their 2nd dose and not cancelled the later appointment.

Yes, the booking system should be robust enough to avoid the latter option, but we know that it's working at full stretch.

Those slots could have been used by someone else.

I was unwell on the day of my first jab. I couldn't cancel online so called 119 and was told they couldn't cancel it and to just rebook when I was feeling better. I did feel very guilty about being a DNA but not sure I could have done anything differently?

I’m sure many of the people not turning up are not turning up because they have covid? I know so many people with it, some have been unable to attend their vaccine appointments.

I called 119 to cancel a second dose (months ago), after going round and round and round in circles on the website with no joy. I was told by someone at 119 that I should not show up to my appointment, and rebook another date the next day online.

There seems to be no easy way to cancel bookings. So you cat really complain when people do as advised by 119

Took me 4 attempts to cancel mine. Just sends you round in circles. We couldn't cancel dh's at all. It wouldn't allow us to. We tried probably about ten times in the end.

Thank you for reminding us!

I had my booster booked, but popped into a walk in centre instead.

I've just now logged in to chancel my original appointment, took a couple of minutes to do.

Bet you are in Scotland where you are given an appointment. In England you book a time convenient.

I had one booked for last week for my booster and I felt rubbish that morning with a sore throat and headache so I decided to reschedule. The booking system didn't give me the option to cancel or reschedule, I just had to let it go by and rebook the next day.

You need to go into Manage my booking - it’s a different option- you can cancel there - I’ve done it .

@SallyAnn32

I had one booked for last week for my booster and I felt rubbish that morning with a sore throat and headache so I decided to reschedule. The booking system didn't give me the option to cancel or reschedule, I just had to let it go by and rebook the next day.

Should have said - it said something along the lines of unable to cancel, come back tomorrow to rebook. Rebooked it for this morning

I tested positive for Covid the day before my second jab was due, I was told I could not cancel at that stage and would just be recorded as a no show. Probably happening to a lot of people!

I booked mine but got offered a sooner appt. there was no option/way to cancel the original appt. maybe it's a lot of people in this situation.

"Manage my booking" wouldn't let me access my appointment

@SurferRona definitely sure.

My situation was this - booked booster via NHS main site for Sat 18. Then got a text from my GP practice inviting me to book via them and secured an appt for 16 December. Then went onto NHS main site and cancelled my original booking. Received a text message confirmation of my cancellation.

Earlier in the year our 1st and 2nd jabs involved 60 mile round trips.
Then a local church 2 mins walk away opened up for vaccination APPOINTMENTS from about July.
For our boosters we walked along and asked nicely if we could walk in.
We were allowed to ( after a short wait to allow any people waiting with appointments to go in first)

Those volunteering were only too pleased to oblige as they too had 'no shows'.

I booked an appointment last week for my adult working daughter 30 miles away as she couldn't do it in her working day, for today (Sunday) as I couldn't book anything closer at the time. several days later I found an appointment within 2 miles.
I tried to cancel the original appointment and it gave me two choices in theory- when I tried to cancel- I had the choice of, to 'book an appointment' or to 'manage booking'. I required the latter obviously, but the NHS site wouldn't allow access, constantly taking me to to the next stage of ' "book appointment ".
I think this is a major mistake and failure of the booking site rather than people not being bothered to cancel. I tried for hours before giving up. I did however give thenm feed back, so they should rectify the glitch hopefully...

Am I using a different system to everyone else? The "manage your appointment" option?

@ExquisitelyDecorated

"Manage my booking" wouldn't let me access my appointment

Same

We had the same issue today. We were offered an appointment closer to home so booked that then went to cancel the appointment today (several hours in advance) via manage bookings using the booking ref and received this message
"If you want to cancel your appointment you will have to come back tomorrow to cancel and rebook." I then tried 119 but no joy as it kept sending me around in loops and I wasn't able to get through to anyone.

@GatoradeMeBitch

Am I using a different system to everyone else? The "manage your appointment" option?

It held me in a queue for ages Then chucked me out after I did get through to change It worked eventually, you may just have been lucky

I tried to but it was early last week when the system was overwhelmed and I couldn't even get on to the system to cancel it (went to an earlier drop in for childcare reasons).

Just remembered I had this issue with my second jab too. I booked it when I had my first and then needed to change as I couldn’t make it. It was literally impossible to change both online and on 119, and I really needed to cancel it so I could rebook a time I could make. I kept getting an error message. Eventually I went to a walk in when they became available and finally got a text saying nhs had cancelled the appt as they had updated their records and I’d had my jab.

YABU

I'm in Wales, where they send you an appointment (e.g. Tuesday at 11am) with no choice of dates / times.

They sent me an appointment with a date I simply couldn't do. I filled out the rescheduling form.

I got a reminder text. Tried to phone them. Couldn't get through despite trying repeatedly. Got another reminder text too.

Presumably I'm down as being a no-show, and some vaccination centre volunteer is cursing my irresponsible self. I did my best to reschedule.

I’ve cancelled and rebooked my appt a couple of times on the booking website with 48 hrs notice, due to work. No issues at all.

YANBU, these appts are sacrosanct for us otherwise, no way would I miss a slot.

@suffolkpunch345 we're booking our own appointments in Scotland for the boosters. Or going to walk in, but they do seem to automatically cancel your appointment if you get an earlier walk in.

I cancelled and rearranged two of mine easily, one just last week. Used the online manage my bookings and it was straight forward, very odd how so many people cant do it.