Arriving late for appointments

Whilst we understand and sympathise when patients arrive late for appointments, each late arrival has a knock-on effect.

It can cause considerable difficulties for patients booked later in the day, who may have to wait longer than expected to see the clinician, and may affect appointments throughout the rest of the day.

To help ensure consistency in the management of late arrivals, any patient arriving more than 10 minutes late will be referred to the clinician to see whether they can still be seen. However, they may be asked to re-book their appointment for another time.

This helps us to be fair to all patients attending that day, reduce the impact of delays and support safe clinical care throughout the day.

Please note that arriving up to 10 minutes late can still have a knock-on effect for the clinician and other patients throughout the day, so we kindly ask that you allow plenty of time to arrive for your appointment whenever possible.