Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Once upon a time, in the land of mission preparation,

Okay, something kinda ironic about me. I have given thousands of shots to myself. Literally, thousands. The shots that I give now, for my insulin pump, are not that much smaller than the shots you get for an immunization like a flu shot, tetanus, Hep A, whatever. The shots that I give myself do not freak me out. It's not my number one hobby, but it takes me about 3 minutes, and no big deal, doesn't really hurt that bad.

When it comes to doctors/nurses giving me shots, I get freaked out. I don't know what it is. It might be that the vaccine going into you hurts way worse than insulin going into you. It might just be that I'm not in control, that someone else is stabbing me. I don't know, but whatever it is, I don't like getting shots from other people. Kinda weird, I know.

So I need to get my hepatitis A and a tetanus (am I spelling that right?) booster before my mission. So this morning my mom calls our general practice doctor and makes sure that I'm good to come in and get those immunizations. For the reasons stated above, I was not in the least excited about this, but I want to be a missionary, so I agreed to go in.

My mom actually called in twice just because there was a little miscommunication about what records I needed to bring, what immunizations I needed, etc. Anyway, I went in today, checked in at the front desk, let them know what vaccines I needed and everything, and they sent me to the waiting room to fill out a big, long insurance page and sign for my dad. After all of this, the nurse opens the door and calls my name. I had actually just finished saying a prayer asking Heavenly Father to help me to be brave (yep, just like a Kindergartner, you better believe it). And as I stand up to head back, the nurse informs me that they don't have two of the vaccinations that I need.

"Uh...I only need two. Hep A and a tetanus booster."

"Yeah, we don't have either of those."

"Uh...okay."

"When you come in for your appointment on Monday, we should have them, and we won't charge you again."

"Uh...okay."

"Thanks for coming in!"

Seriously? You couldn't have told my mom when she called in? Or maybe the second time she called in? Perhaps when I came to the front desk? Maybe before you had me spend 20 minutes filling out insurance information? The detail that YOU COULDN'T HELP ME didn't seem relevant until then?

That's poor customer service, folks.

Trust me, I was once a customer service rep.

3 comments:

Kate said...

Yikes. That is terrible. But at least you didn't get kicked in the face. Now THAT would have been poor customer service.

Leslie said...

That's bad. Being kicked in the face would be also be bad, but getting confused with the guy who's there to get an enema would be even worse!
Sorry for your wasted time and resulting frustration.

Lindy-Lou said...

The worst part is that you still have to live in fear of getting those dastardly immunizations. No worries. No doubt there will soon be a federal czar to regulate customer service. Boy will he be busy!