The Newbattle Medical Group Phone System
At the start of October the practice introduced a new phone system which makes patients aware as to where they are in the queue. This will to allow you to decide whether you wish to hold on or call back later when the lines may be quieter.
There are no other changes from the phone system we previously operated. This was made as the previous telephone system allowed only 4 calls to queue at any time and cut off any others waiting, meaning that patients constantly had to redial in order to book an appointment. The waiting period to be answered was no different if anything it may have been longer as we are now able to see the number of patients waiting in the queue and increase the number of receptionists answering the calls to enable patient’s calls to be answered quicker.
Currently the practice answers an average 4 calls every minute at peak times, therefore if you were number 36 in the queue it would take approximately 9 minutes for your call to be answered.
The size of the queue is driven by patient demand on a daily basis.
Since the 3rd of October we have had the ability to see how many calls are coming through the practice. During the period from 3rd October up to the 31st October (a three week period) a total of 11486 calls were answered by our reception.
In November a total number of 11430 calls were answered between the 1st and 30th of the month.
