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Its bad enough to fill the form out online EVERY SINGLE TIME but most of the time when I get to the appointment they will ask me AGAIN if my address has changed (since I filled out the online form yesterday?) and so on. What a waste of time.

Like Margaret, it's just me here. Anyone trying to access my stuff would need to get into my house - past locks and alarms - then into my computer (password protected) then into my secure drive (a different password) or my online portal (yet another password). WiFi is totally locked down, hidden, inaccessible. How is adding more "authentication" crap going to help keep anyone's stuff more secure? Answer: it won't. What makes good sense in a multi-person office, or large corporation, is simply stupid in a one-person operation and leads to the idiocy of passwords on post-it notes stuck to the side of the monitor.

All of my doctors use different systems, so the questions are basically the same but in different orders, on different forms, and worded differently -- so you can answer Yes to one and No to the same info but worded as did you ever instead of did you never. You have to read carefully and read every page. I'm 78 and can NOT remember when I had my last period or when I had my tonsils out (3rd grade? how old was I in 3rd grade? what year was that?). And if the form is seeming too easy, it's probably because I already responded to the email so now the text is a duplicate!

I thought everyone knew that putting your password on the side of the monitor wasn't safe, you have to put it under your keyboard where it can't be seen. LOL.

Question for those using a 'secure' client portal such as Verifyle: I am a sole practitioner. To access my computer one has to have the login and password. To access Verifyle, one must have a different login and password as with my tax software. I don't see how having yet another authenticator for either of these does any more to protect my client data from myself. What I do not see with Verifyle is how to 'authenticate' or otherwise control my client's access to the portal with that client's information. Am I missing something (highly likely)?

Lucky for me, I don't have to do too many appointments. The annual eye exam, regular dental exam. I should I suppose go to my GP for a physical (I think they call it a Wellness Exam now). The last time at my GP, she said after three years, they consider me a new patient. So I guess I should try to get in within the threee year limit. Ha.

The worst part is that you have to listen through all of the options so that you can press Y to confirm or N to cancel.

Ah, those pre-registration online forms....So within the same hospital system (all my doctors save one), every #$%^&^%$#$%^ (thanks, Catherine, for this special word) appointment reminder requires ALL of this same information which they already have. I'm 79, I had one child and won't have anymore even though I'm not on birth control. Geez! At least we are not alone.

It becomes more and more important to plant a medicinal herb garden...

I prepare a Partnership for a client of mine. I have four years of K-1s for her Partner who has never filed a return in those four years. It's not high income, but is SE income and a fair amount of money. How can this not be caught?. I file the Partnership return with the IRS and Wisconsin. My client claims her Partnership and pays her taxes religiously.

The tax software companies got tired of so many support calls being about authenticator codes, that they had to make it optional or support was going to be overwhelmed by people who couldn't cope with an authenticator code.

And your doctor recommends you to another specialist. Let's say your primary doctor recommends you to a dermatologist. Now you have to fill out and answer the same questions over and over again - same information that your primary doctor has. They can't or won't share information - "privacy" they call it. A year later you go back to the same dermatologist -same questions over and over again.

This sounds like the "Mychart" system that my Doctor's office uses. The pre-registration questions go on and on and on for pages

I got a phone message left just today, reminding me of an appointment for something or other. Let's just ignore that I already got, and responded to, the email notice. And went online and filled in all the #$%^&^%$#$%^ forms they now require (where you have to click all the &*@#$%& checkboxes; it was ridiculous). My guess is the text message comes next. Message was annoying but at least funny. Recorded, not even a real person, and it sounded like the "play" speed had been mis-set to make the recording sound like the "person" was either drunk or tranquilized.

Curious, TIGTA released a report saying that the IRS had found concentrations of High Income Non Filers in western Texas, eastern New Mexico, Wyoming and northwestern Nevada.

This IRS statement from August 2024 might be relevant to this conversation: https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/multi-factor-authentication-key-protection-to-tax-professionals-security-arsenal-now-required I'm neither defending it nor criticizing it - just putting it out there for consideration.

EAs left out? Not surprised, most politicians can't spell EA, let alone describe our licensure. Tom Longview, TX

Our dentist's office is a sole proprietorship--not part of some national chain. There are two people working in the office. Yet when I call them there is a menu, "press 1 for appointments, press 2 for billing, press 3 for...." It's not like they have 16 different departments to route my call to. Grrrrrrr. Some of our clients have expressed surprise that when they call us a real person answers the phone. Sad.

@Pacun and everyone, I fixed the link so that it now goes to the official IRS page for direct pay.

Lots of that around here with medical practices too. My husband usually has to drive to his GP's office because they never answer the phone and their portal is useless ever since they were bought out by the major hospital here. It's right here in town, so only about 1/4 mile away. That hospital is buying up lots of the smaller independent offices. Today, husband drove about 10 miles round trip to his new ENT's office in order to change an appointment. They also never answer, and last week he'd left a message, someone called back on Monday only to have a click followed by silence on the other end when he answered the call. Yesterday he tried to call back 4 times without success, so he was mad enough to go in person today. Receptionist said that scheduling is outsourced to a third party. There are numerous and frequent complaints on social media about this particular office being hard to contact, and I knew it would be a problem. It's a shame because the original office was very responsive over the years my mother used them, but they merged with a larger practice sometime last year and this is the way the larger practice runs. Simply awful.