Welcome to the VA!

It's been a year since we lost our insurance, and James hasn't had a physical in much longer than that.

The other day, I decided to do him a solid and apply to the Veteran's Administration for healthcare. It wasn't a difficult process, and we received a communication today that assured James that the VA was diligently trying to set up his initial appointment.

There was a phone number for him to call, which was listed as: 1-800-4231-2111.

So.

We were able to Google it and there was just an extra "1" in what should have been the three-digit middle number. James called using my phone because that's where the clickable Google phone number was.

An hour into the call, James came in to me panicked because someone had answered the phone but couldn't hear James. We fixed that, James left again, and then came back a few minutes later.

Apparently the guy had told James that his chart was empty and they needed to fill out some more information so we could make an appointment. Then he put James on a hold that seemed to be the same queue James had been in before.

I was doing something mindless and told James to just leave the phone by me. About 15 minutes later, someone finally answered. I explained what was happening, and they said they needed to transfer me to the person who could set the appointment.

James came back in as the person was answering (that was only a few seconds, so huzzah!) and said he needed to make an appointment. Guess what?

The local clinic had closed at 4:00 PM (it was 4:02 PM at this moment) so we'd need to call back tomorrow. WE HAD CALLED AT 2:41 PM.

I asked for a direct number, and she said that they don't have one; you have to call the main number. She said you can also just walk in and make an appointment on site, which might be easier? That seems bonkers to me.

James tried to explain about the wrongly-rendered phone number but she didn't seem to understand what he was trying to say, as she explained something about how recently the extensions had changed. She was fine. She was trying. But this process was ridiculous.

Wish us luck for tomorrow.