Used it at work today--A Vet's Office Story

[Pinky830]

 
 What she wanted was for me to say, "Here's Dr. Tina's personal number.  Go ahead and call her whenever you like later today/tomorrow and tell her of your concerns.  She may even meet you here at the clinic if you want your cat to be seen."  However, I was not about to do this.  I had described everything SSC told me to Dr. Tina, and she assured me that the cat was fine as long as he was eating/drinking and using the bathroom normally.  

This sounds to me like she did communicate with the vet during the call.

I modified.  But, at the same time there is nothing in the original that this interaction was relayed to the client.
 
Honsetly, she sounds like a concerned cat owner and I can't see that what she did was rude.
 
It kind of gets to me that people will come here and vent about work situations interacting with the public as if they are social interactions which they are not.  Presumably there is some sort of office policy in place to determine how to handle concerned pet owners.
 
"I'm afraid that won't be possible" is a phrase used to shut someone down.  It's a little disturbing to me that one would want to do that to a concerned client.  What would seem more productive would be to tell the client what is possible rather than trying to shut them down.  In these situations, I just don't think its that polite.  I certainly don't see it as a kind of victory over a rude person.
 
For the social interaction, saying that phrase creates a kind of policy in a way that helps strengthen an individuals ability to stand their ground.  In business, you can say it, but there most likely policies in place that one can point to repeatedly without having to try and shut a person down like this.
 

I disagree with you, strongly.  The owner described what the cat was doing, and the OP explained that this was normal post-op behaviour and everything was fine.  It's her job to know this, and to stop the vet having to handle 500 calls a day when they could instead be in surgery or doing something more useful.  It's the OP's job to know what is going on with pets and how they should be - there was no reason for the owner to keep going on and on and on.  I find that attitude that only a single vet can ever be consulted quite irritating - answering questions like this is what the OP is paid for.

Presumably when I go to a vet, I pay for the expertise of the vet and not his/her secretary or receptionist.  If I called my vet with concerns and was stonewalled from having my concerns relayed to the vet for consideration, I would find another vet.  Unless the person answering the phone is qualified to make decisions about the medical care of the pet, then it is not what they are paid for.
 
The OP cleared up that she was relaying concerns to the vet.
 
Dealing with the public is not easy.  It take a lot of skill and experience.  It's not just about answering phones.   But, it's also not a social interaction and being that it is something one is paid to do, one must be more careful in how the interactions are handled because a pet's life and a vet's reputation are at the heart of it.

And how do you know the OP is not a vet tech?  You are very dismissive of the workers at vets' offices - in my experience, they all have some animal care training.  Enough to deal with issues like this (all for free, of course).

I must say, I find your tone very rude.

Guys. You're both right. This is an issue that comes up all the time. It's an exceedingly fine line and no matter what staff member talks to the client or what the question is, there's no 100% answer. For that matter, just the fact that they are on the phone instead of in the office introduces some risk...I could talk to the client myself and either think what they were describing was fine and it isn't, or think it isn't fine and it actually is. If a staff member talks to them, it's een harder because yo don't know what their training is. We have this problem constantly at my office because one receptionist has no medical training at all, and the other one has years of tech experience.

The OP did clarify that she asked the doctor. The SS's misconduct was in insisting that she had to talk to THAT doctor, no other, and right away.

[Audrey Quest]

 
 What she wanted was for me to say, "Here's Dr. Tina's personal number.  Go ahead and call her whenever you like later today/tomorrow and tell her of your concerns.  She may even meet you here at the clinic if you want your cat to be seen."  However, I was not about to do this.  I had described everything SSC told me to Dr. Tina, and she assured me that the cat was fine as long as he was eating/drinking and using the bathroom normally.  

This sounds to me like she did communicate with the vet during the call.

I modified.  But, at the same time there is nothing in the original that this interaction was relayed to the client.
 
Honsetly, she sounds like a concerned cat owner and I can't see that what she did was rude.
 
It kind of gets to me that people will come here and vent about work situations interacting with the public as if they are social interactions which they are not.  Presumably there is some sort of office policy in place to determine how to handle concerned pet owners.
 
"I'm afraid that won't be possible" is a phrase used to shut someone down.  It's a little disturbing to me that one would want to do that to a concerned client.  What would seem more productive would be to tell the client what is possible rather than trying to shut them down.  In these situations, I just don't think its that polite.  I certainly don't see it as a kind of victory over a rude person.
 
For the social interaction, saying that phrase creates a kind of policy in a way that helps strengthen an individuals ability to stand their ground.  In business, you can say it, but there most likely policies in place that one can point to repeatedly without having to try and shut a person down like this.
 

I disagree with you, strongly.  The owner described what the cat was doing, and the OP explained that this was normal post-op behaviour and everything was fine.  It's her job to know this, and to stop the vet having to handle 500 calls a day when they could instead be in surgery or doing something more useful.  It's the OP's job to know what is going on with pets and how they should be - there was no reason for the owner to keep going on and on and on.  I find that attitude that only a single vet can ever be consulted quite irritating - answering questions like this is what the OP is paid for.

Presumably when I go to a vet, I pay for the expertise of the vet and not his/her secretary or receptionist.  If I called my vet with concerns and was stonewalled from having my concerns relayed to the vet for consideration, I would find another vet.  Unless the person answering the phone is qualified to make decisions about the medical care of the pet, then it is not what they are paid for.
 
The OP cleared up that she was relaying concerns to the vet.
 
Dealing with the public is not easy.  It take a lot of skill and experience.  It's not just about answering phones.   But, it's also not a social interaction and being that it is something one is paid to do, one must be more careful in how the interactions are handled because a pet's life and a vet's reputation are at the heart of it.

And how do you know the OP is not a vet tech?  You are very dismissive of the workers at vets' offices - in my experience, they all have some animal care training.  Enough to deal with issues like this (all for free, of course).

I must say, I find your tone very rude.

Then, please feel free to ignore my posts.

[War_Doc]

Okay, let's play nicely and get back on track to the original question.  No need to be sniping at each other.  Shake hands and move onward.

[Audrey Quest]

The OP did clarify that she asked the doctor. The SS's misconduct was in insisting that she had to talk to THAT doctor, no other, and right away.

My impression of the conversation was that the OP kept telling her that she couldn't speak to the doctor, that the doctor would be unavailable after a certain time, etc and after the woman's anxiety hit level 10, she told her that he would call her back and that satisfied her.
 
The question in my mind initially was why not just tell her that to begin with.
 
Why not take down the information, tell her you will consult the vet and call her back as soon as she knows something.
 
I always find that it works better to tell someone what you can do for them rather than what you can't do.

[RooRoo]

"The question in my mind initially was why not just tell her that to begin with."

Because she didn't want to force the doctor to have to spend ten minutes of her valuable time telling the patient the exact same thing the tech has already told her. "Not serious; come in before noon or go to the emergency clinic."

In a retail situation, calling the manager to deal with this would have been fine. This is not a retail situation.

Vet techs are the same thing as nurses. They are trusted by the doctors to provide relevant information, from both pets in the hospital, and from their owners on the phone. They DO know what is normal post-surgical behavior.

And they deal with an extraordinary number of people who panic unnecessarily.

How would you like to wait in your own doctor's office for two hours, because the doc is on the phone explaining over and over, to one overly anxious person after another, what their office hours are and where the after-hours clinic or emergency room is located?

You'd resent that, wouldn't you? How do you think the doctor feels?

Rooroo, who tries to be a reasonable patient and/or owner