Yesterday (Monday), I got to the financial services office in the afternoon. It’s not in the building with the pharmacy and huge waiting room. It’s kind of hard to explain where exactly it is, just ask for directions.
Also, when I got to the room, the two doors were closed, but unlocked. So if you find the doors closed, just try opening them.
Once in, the procedure is to go to the front “desk.” I said I was a new patient and that it was my first time in the office. I was told to wait in a line to speak to a person who gave me a yellow ticket. They have yellow numbered tickets and tickets with numbers written in blue marker. I don’t know what the differences between them are.
The numbers being called are displayed on digital screens. Someone also comes out of a room on the left to call out numbers or names. It’s not over a speaker so it is sometimes hard to hear the person.
Sometimes, people’s numbers are skipped over and they’re called by name a while after their number has been passed over. I don’t know the reason for this either. Perhaps they missed their number or they had special situations (like having difficulty with English).
It took about two hours for me to be called. I was able to pass much of the time by talking to people and trying to ignore how uncomfortable the chairs were.
The person I spoke to was courteous and seemed interested in helping me. I was able to display all the documentation that was required. (They give you the list when you go to the medical center. In general, bring proof of your name with photo id, who’s in your household, your income or lack of income, residency, etc.) However, when he saw my most recent tax return, he appeared to indicate that it was too high, even though I’ve been out of work for over a year and a half and my husband has been out of work for months. He said that I should come back within 60 days with my husband’s last two pay checks. As of right now, it seems like my application might be on hold. Rather than keep asking questions, I figured I’d just come back with the documents he requested on another day and deal with it then. Thankfully, he gave me a paper that said I had a temporary waiver, which allowed for me to get my current set of medications for free.
When I was done, I went to the pharmacy. I used the electronic machine to get a number starting with “B” to pick-up my prescriptions. The procedure appears to be that you go to the cashier, pay your bill or show that you’re not obligated to pay, then go to another window to actually get the bag of medications. Thankfully, I only had to wait about 20 minutes. I think this was because it was close to the time when the pharmacy stops accepting drop-offs. Either that or it could simply be because picking-up is a shorter process than dropping off.
Overall, my main pieces of advice: bring food, a book, a friend, and every bit of paperwork you are given or you think may be relevant. Good luck!
