"We could not cancel appointment"

My father in law was taken into hospital and as such we  needed to cancel his routine blood test. He was told frequently by email a missed appointment would cost money.

The booking was done via Swiftqueue but we couldn't access his account. We therefore tried to call. 8 calls later to Amersham through numerous numbers and having been transferred numerous times but with no answer I gave up. The switchboard operators I spoke to didn't seem to want to take any ownership of my issue or present alternative options. No means to email, text, WhatsApp or other options. Therefore we could not cancel his appointment to allow another person to access this service, and probably will get an email asking to explain his no show.

In the 21st century and with an ageing population, this cannot be the first time this has happened and a simple digital messaging option would be really helpful.