"The terrible phone service you ..."

What could be improved

The terrible phone service you are purchasing from "patient line" / hospedia

It costs over 50 TIMES as much to call this "service", as it does for me to call a normal phone number in the UK.

The caller is then subjected to a smarmy voice for approximately 1 minute (at 49p per minute!!) before one can even enter the extension!

After that, to add insult to injury, the last 5 times I've tried to call my party, the call has been immediately cut off and replaced with voicemail. This happened even after I asked a nurse, via the ward phone, to assist. In other words, the staff also have no idea how to make the system work properly.

In the evenings I invariably get an engaged tone from the system itself, so can't get through at all

Please, please replace this terrible service,

or at the very least, set it so that callers can enter the extension immediately, without having to listen again to Mr Sterling Smarm and his interminable, superfluous and expensive announcement.