"Appointment unfilled"

last week around 6pm I received a call with “No Caller ID”.

The caller asked if they were speaking to my name, I said that they were and was then offered an follow up appointment at the ENT department this weekend in the morning I said yes however the caller said that due to the short notice there would be no time to send out a confirmation letter.

When I returned home that evening I realised that I was teaching that day so I rang the ENT in the morning and asked if I could move the appointment to the afternoon slot. I'd been offered a morning or afternoon slot in the original phone call. The person I spoke to moved the appointment to the afternoon and I rearranged my afternoon teaching for another date.

Half an hour before my appointment I parked in the car park in the pouring rain and tried to find a ticket machine. There were signs regarding the pay and display procedure but they were unreadable because of the darkness (GMT + torrential rain).

I attempted to login on the machines on the right of the entrance foyer as there was no-one manning reception. I went through to the end of the login process and the machine said it was unable to log me in. I then went straight up to the ENT dept. (OP5 1st Floor) climbed up the stairs and into the waiting area. There was nobody around at all. No patients, no staff and the shutters were down on the reception area. I looked around for someone to help me, I even called out “Hello! Anybody here!” in a loud voice, but answer came there none.

I then went back down to the main reception to see if anyone could help me there. One man said there was only one OP clinic open so I went in there to ask. I spoke to a lovely person who was very helpful but ultimately unable to find out anything for me. 

So, half an hour after my appointment time, I went back to my car and drove off. Fortunately, the Pay & Display machines were out of order so I wasn't charged for my time.

Right.

I've just phoned up the ENT dept and spoke to the same person who moved my appointment, who (was trying to be helpful but) claimed that the clinic was open til 4pm on the Saturday so I will be sent out a Did Not Attend letter. This is the very thing that I am concerned about. I'm a huge supporter of the NHS, I have family in medicine, we've always supported Left wing causes etc and the one thing you don't do is miss NHS appointments. Now this staff member insisted that the clinic was open. I'm insisting that I was there for my appointment. However if there's no staff, no receptionist and the blinds are down, I don't think that it's unreasonable for me to have thought “I won't be seen.”

I don't wish to cause more work for the already overstretched resources but I would hate for my attendance record to be spoiled because of lack of proper covering staff. A doctor's valuable time has been wasted, my time has been wasted, I'm wasting more time phoning staff, whose time is being wasted because they said they would contact management. 

Can someone please contact me and resolve this issue. 

Thank you