Answering Service Communication
If you have ever called us after hours, you know that we employ a "live" answering service to answer phones in order to triage phone calls to either scheduling or nursing. As a reminder, if you leave a message with the answering service and they say they will reach the on-call person to give you a call back - please make sure you
do
get that return phone call within 15 minutes. Here is why:
Last week, we had an employee call at 7:53am and speak to the Answering Service because she was not well and needed to call out sick. Unfortunately, the Answering Service did not page the on-call staff and the caregiver did not call back to speak with someone in the office when she didn’t receive a call back. We didn’t know this when she didn’t show up for her shift at 9am and the client called stating that she didn’t arrive. Hillary was unable to reach the employee (it went straight to VM) and tried to text and email her, too. This was worrisome because it was unlike this particular caregiver to not show up for a shift. It prompted the office to call her two listed Emergency Contacts on file because we were worried. The caregiver finally emailed Hillary 3 hrs later stating she had been ill, went to the Emergency Room, and that she had called the Answering Service this morning.
So the lesson learned is: We will always call you back when you call after hours or on weekends.
If you don't receive a timely call back from the on call staff, please call again to make sure that the message was indeed sent out!
We don't want to worry your emergency contacts unnecessarily.
THANK YOU
