Right to Respond

As part of our commitment to providing an honest and transparent view of health and social care services, Healthwatch Birmingham encourages providers to respond to comments the public have left.

Alongside ensuring providers can have a fair say in discussions about their services, replying to reviews demonstrates evidence of responding to patient feedback for the CQC, who regularly monitor our Feedback Centre. It is also an effective way to recruit service users for any wider engagement work at your organisation.

Guidelines for provider responses:

  • Keep language appropriate and civil
  • Remain professional and treat people’s comments fairly
  • Engage with the content of the review by addressing specific points and avoid cut and pasting a standard response
  • Don’t disclose the service user’s personal details or any potentially identifying information
  • Where appropriate leave organisational contact details e.g PALS or patient engagement teams for people to get further information

Remember: your response will be seen by everyone who uses the Feedback Centre, not just the original reviewer. All responses are moderated in accordance with our moderation policy.

For full terms and conditions, including a guide to how right to reply works for service providers download this guide.

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Original feedback for

Millennium Medical Centre


Worst and rudest receptionists ever

Was registered in this practice for 20 years + At the start all was good. Could get a GP appointment on the day, or in advance. But over the years the situation degraded. The receptionists got more and more abrupt and rude. I suspect one of them acted as a bad apple and slowly corrupted the whole team with her negativity. They all ended up being snappy. They often interrupt you while you are explaining what you were after, not apologising when they realised that their advise was actually misdirected. But over the last few years, especially since Covid it has reached absolute madness. It is no longer possible to make an appointment a few days in advance for non-urgent things, you have to call on the day. When you call just a few seconds after the lines open, the queue is already full. When you finally get through (28 call attempts in 1h15 is my record) they no longer have any appointment left. And then the lady has the cheek to tell you that there were periods when the phone wasn't ringing (implying I am lying? Totally impossible with a queue of 10 people). Now, they no longer keep a few spares 'emergency' slots, so when you finally got through their speciality is now to refer you to the walk-in service in Selly Oak. Utter disgrace. Absolute no care for patients. After 4 unsuccessful days in a row, ended up using that walk-in service who rushed me to A&E. Millenium Medical Centre receptionists did not care at all when I was telling them my heart conditions started to get strange again. A&E adjusted my medication (should have been one of the MMC GP's duty) When called a few days later to try to get these medication adjustment made permanent, same circus. Ended up being fobbed off to Selly Oak's walk-in service. The GPs used to be OK (when you could have access to them) but now not only are the receptionists rude and useless, but as illustrated in the above exemple they do not even care for symptoms which are serious. Bunch of grumpy jobsworth who do not deserve their salaries but the sack!