Submitted by Lenore, Dec 10, 2007 11:54

I work for a dialysis unit and deal with Access-A-Ride on a daily basis. We have had many problems with their service and their treatment of patients. Dialysis patients must be hooked up to a machine that cleans their blood for from 3-4 1/2 hours. They must be at our facility for a certain time to get their full treatment which is very necessary to their well-being. On occasion, we have had Access-A-Ride drivers leave a blind, wheelchair bound patient in the foyer, unbeknownst to us at the center, and the patient not found until a worker happened to stumble upon him.

Also, we have had patients come up to an hour late - because they had to stay on the ambulette while others were picked up or dropped off - and then, the same driver would come back to pick the patient up (who still had an hour left to treat due to being late) and since the patient was not ready, the driver would leave and the patient would be stranded. Upon a situation like this, we would call Access-A-Ride, only to receive the attitude that the patient should have been ready because they had a set pick up time. When we explained that this was due to them getting the patient here late, the normal response is "Well, this is public transportation, you know!"

They have also left patients in our waiting room for over 3 hours at a time. In this situation, we had an amputee in a wheelchair. Access-A-Ride had mistakenly sent a car for her. When we called them, they responded, "We don't have any buses on all of Staten Island so she will have to just sit and wait."

Also, I couldn't even count how many times I have been hung up on by Access-A-Ride employees.

We deal with many ambulette services and none of them come close to turning my stomach the way Access-A-Ride's employees do - with the exception of RJR Access-A-Ride in Staten Island who are very curteous to us. Access-A-Ride seems to be the only transportation service we deal with that gives us the attitude "We don't need you, you need us."

I hope to never be at Access-A-Ride's mercy!

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