Difficulties of trying to speak to human at GPs
I WRITE to share with your readers my disheartening experience whenever calling my GP surgery.
I ring the surgery punctually at 8am (as repeatedly instructed over the years).
A recorded voice goes through all the instructions regarding Covid, only to inform me at the end that no calls can be taken at the moment. “Try after eleven.”
I don’t fall for this trick for, whenever in the past I’ve attempted to make an appointment later in the day, a recorded voice would instruct me to ring at 8am (the next day).
So, I hold on to the phone. For the next 20 minutes I am repeatedly instructed about Covid and repeatedly cut off. Finally, another recorded voice informs me that I am 27th in the queue.
For the next 50 minutes I listen to the music on the handset, my nerves taut with fear of being cut off.
When I’m told I am first in the queue, I go weak with relief, but then I hear the telephone ringing at the other end for another eight minutes, before a human voice answers my call. Altogether, 78 minutes of waiting to have my call answered at my surgery.
Twice in recent months, because of this dire difficulty to reach another human at our surgery, desperation drove me to seek help in a pharmacy and a walk-in centre (to no avail) before resorting to the 111 service.
What a waste of this service’s precious time, when all my husband needed was a prescription for a recurring condition, which a nurse would write out for him in the preCovid times.
I appeal to the representatives of the general practice surgeries to speak to the Leicester Mercury and explain to the public, why all attempts to get hold of another human being when calling one’s surgery has become such a nightmare?
K Myers, Leicester
A FoRMER Mercury photographer’s aerial images have been unearthed and offer a fascinating glimpse of a changing city.
The treasure trove of aerial photos from across Leicester and Leicestershire has been uncovered with the help of Mercury chief photographer Andy Baker.
The shots show the area in the 1970s and 1980s in the era before drones were commonplace and you could grab satellite photos of anywhere you like using Google Earth. Back then, the Mercury would charter an aircraft for a day to get these shots.
Andy says: “I received an email from the daughter of a former Leicester Mercury photographer Peter Elliott. She said that her mum had been sorting through some files and come across a large collection of aerial pictures take by her husband during and before his time with the paper and would I be interested in seeing them?
“’Yes please!’ I said without a second’s hesitation. I duly popped over to see them and have been
A treasure trove of 1970s and 80s aerial photos from across Leicester and Leicestershire has been uncovered by Leicester Mercury chief photographer Andy Baker. Using the work of former Mercury photographer Peter Elliott, we have placed each one alongside a ‘today’ view from Google Earth as a comparison, making for what we think is a fascinating series given the opportunity to share them in the paper. We thought it might be a nice idea to show the pictures and put along a ‘today’ view from Google Earth as a comparison.”
Today we have the Leicestershire Police HQ in St John’s, Enderby.
Many of us will have driven past the complex, set back off the B4114, close to the Fosse Park shopping centre, without ever really noticing it. And as the headquarters is not an operational police station, there is often little reason for members of the public to visit.