Days after overbooking forced some people to be turned away at one of Collin County's largest COVID-19 vaccination sites, things appeared to run more smoothly Monday at John Clark Stadium in Plano.
Hundreds of people with appointments to receive the vaccine were turned away on Thursday after Collin County Health Care Services said it overbooked appointments because it saw large numbers of no-shows on daily appointment schedules earlier in the week.
A vaccine contractor said it would make changes and those turned away were offered new appointment times.
“I thought, 'Great, I’ve got the weekend to recover.' About three or four hours later I get another phone call that said, 'We’re sorry for the inconvenience but you’ve now been rescheduled until Monday,'” said Shelbi Morales, who got vaccinated Monday after her Friday appointment was postponed.
An estimated 750 people were turned away Thursday, even though they waited for hours and had a valid appointment.
“I was a little annoyed about being rescheduled but, like my husband and I both said, it’s worth it. It’s worth a little bit of frustration,” Morales said.
The company hired to handle vaccination operations said it was working on improving technology and installing new software to handle appointments.
Collin County Health Care Services on Tuesday announced it was temporarily suspending new COVID-19 vaccine sign ups while it works through its current waitlist for people in Phases 1A and 1B.
Matthew Murphy, of Frisco, arrived up cautiously optimistic, after having to re-arrange his schedule last week.
“I’m a veterinarian. I had 6 surgeries scheduled, so I had to reschedule a bunch of things, and then call them back and say, 'Yep, we’re ready to go again.' So it’s a pain in the butt,” Murphy said.
The issue was brought up Monday afternoon at the Collin County Commissioners Court.
The county said it hoped to catch up on rescheduled appointments as soon as possible.
“Today they’re doing will-calls that have rolled over from Thursday and Friday. As of about noon they had about 500 they’d handled, so we’re expecting they’ll get up right around 1,000,” Collin County Administrator Bill Bilyeu said.
