Access Booking Officer

Merseywestlancs; Ormskirk; Hybrid; GBP 26,000 - 27,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Flexible working

Generous pension scheme

27 days annual leave (pro rata)

Job summary

Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust is seeking an Access Booking Officer to coordinate inpatient and outpatient bookings at Ormskirk District General Hospital. The role supports timely access, prioritises clinical requirements, and maintains accurate waiting lists within a busy NHS setting.

Based at Ormskirk, you will work with multidisciplinary teams to ensure smooth patient pathways and adherence to 18-week and other waiting-time targets, contributing to Five Star Patient

Qualifications

• ECDL or equivalent ICT qualification.
• NVQ 2 in Customer Care or equivalent experience.
• NVQ 3 in Business and Administration.

Responsibilities

• Provide comprehensive inpatient and outpatient service to patients and manage bookings.
• Liaise with patients, relatives and staff to plan admissions and outpatient appointments.
• Maintain waiting lists and ensure adherence to national waiting time standards.

Skills

Excellent communication

Data accuracy

Organisational skills

Education

ECDL or equivalent

NVQ 2 Customer Care or equivalent

NVQ 3 Business and Administration

Tools

Medway hospital system

PAS/ERS systems

Galaxy theatre system

Job description

We want talented and enthusiastic people from all backgrounds to join #TeamMWL, with us you can learn, grow and develop yourself and your career, realising your true ambitions and aspirations.

Whatever you’re looking for in your career, you’ll find it here at MWL.

Main area Access and Booking Grade NHS AfC: Band 3 Contract Permanent: Monday - Friday 9.00 hrs- 17.00 hrs Hours Full time - 37.5 hours per week Job ref 409-8174946

Site Ormskirk Hospital Town Ormskirk Salary £25,760 - £27,476 Per Annum pro rata Salary period Yearly Closing 27/09/2026 23:59 Interview date 09/10/2026

Job overview

As an Access Booking Officer at MWL NHS Trust, you will play a vital role in ensuring patients are booked efficiently and appropriately for Inpatient appointments and diagnostic procedures. Based within the Access Centre at Ormskirk District General Hospital, you’ll be responsible for the day-to-day coordination of outpatient bookings.

You’ll work closely with team leaders and administrative teams to ensure that patients are scheduled according to clinical priority, waiting times, and procedural requirements. This role demands excellent communication skills, attention to detail, and the ability to work independently in a fast-paced environment.

Your contribution will directly support the Trust’s commitment to delivering Five Star Patient Care to a population of over 600,000 people across the Merseyside, West Lancashire, and surrounding areas.

Interviews will take place on 9th October, 2026

Main duties of the job

As an Access Booking Officer at Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust (MWL), your role is central to ensuring smooth and efficient patient access to outpatient services. Here’s a summary of the main duties:

• Administrative Support: General office duties include updating records, handling correspondence, and maintaining accurate data on the Hospital Patient Administrative System (Medway).

Communication: Strong telephone and interpersonal skills are essential, as you’ll be in regular contact with patients and other departments.

Independence and Initiative: The role requires someone who can work autonomously, manage time effectively, and adapt to changing priorities.

This position is typically based at Ormskirk District General Hospital and supports the Trust’s commitment to delivering Five Star Patient Care

Working for our organisation

Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust serves a population of over 600,000 with a workforce of over 9000 dedicated and skilled staff across 21 sites.

We strongly believe that the communities we serve should all have access to Five Star Patient Care.

Our Services:

Acute Care

Providing emergency and maternity services at Whiston, Southport and Ormskirk hospitals, and medical and surgical specialties across all our sites.

Primary Care

Providing primary care services at Marshalls Cross Medical Centre situated in St Helens Hospital.

Community Services

Providing adult community services for St Helens and a wheelchair service in Chorley, South Ribble, and West Lancashire. Our inpatient unit at Newton Community Hospital is where patients needing acute hospital beds can continue rehabilitation, freeing up space for more unwell patients. We also provide urgent care at our Urgent Treatment Centre located in St Helens town centre.

Specialist Regional Services

We provide the Mersey Regional Burns & Plastic Surgery Unit at Whiston Hospital and the Spinal Injuries Unit at Southport Hospital to more than 4 million people across the whole of Merseyside, West Lancashire, Cheshire, Isle of Man and North Wales.

Achievements:

Rated Outstanding by CQC Inspection August 2018

Top 100 places to work in the NHS (NHS Employers & Health Service Journal)

National Preceptorship Accreditation (2023) for Nursing & AHP Preceptorship Programme

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

KEY DUTIES

• To provide a comprehensive inpatient and outpatient service to patients. The post will rotate through each of the areas within the access office to enable cover in all respects of the service.
• To be named contact point liaising with patients, relatives and/or carers as well as medical representatives, GP’s, nursing staff, surgical team and support services to ensure the admission is appropriately planned and managed. This can be face to face, over the telephone, in writing or electronic.
• Accurate addition of patients to the waiting list ensuring any relevant notes recorded.
• To provide advice to patients with matters relating to their admission (pre and post operative guidance) and with regard to their position on the waiting list.
• To plan multiple theatre/procedure lists up to six weeks in advance, using clinical knowledge, medical terminology and information to meet the patients’ 18-week, diagnostic, cancer and/or 28-day rescheduling targets.
• Ensure that with effective planning and organisation the theatre/procedure lists are utilised to their maximum potential which requires taking in to account specific patient needs, cancelling/rescheduling patients, replacing short notice cancellations, liaising with the surgeon to ensure theatre list order considering all patient and theatre information.
• Responsible for communicating information and changes relating to elective admissions, theatre lists etc with regards intended procedures, specific kit requirements, specific anaesthetic input to relevant staff Trustwide.
• Ensuring where required appropriate funding is in place or authorised to allow the patient to proceed to admission.
• Identify, attempt to resolve and pre-empt situations which may result in a breach of access targets. Regularly analyze waiting list information to ensure compliance with national waiting time standards and elevate in a timely manner any requirements for additional capacity to ensure patients are treated within waiting time standards.
• To work flexibly according to the needs of the service including covering for colleagues during periods of leave.
• Liase with Bed Manager in the case of patients being put on ‘stand-by’ or cancelled due to extraneous circumstances (i.e. bed unavailability.
• Ensure that all patients are placed on galaxy (theatre system) as soon as patients’ booking is confirmed.
• Ensure finalised theatre lists are forwarded to the respective secretaries for circulation allowing adequate preparation by theatres and sterile services in order to minimise cancellations (currently 48hours circulation)
• With knowledge and understanding of the 18-week RTT and compliant/non-compliant pathways add patients to the waiting list ensuring correct linkage.
• Responsible for appointing all patients from the PTLs and managing all Outpatient waiting lists to ensure accurate patient management, enabling the Trust to meet all of its performance targets.
• Responsible for registration of referral letters, ensuring all referral letters and ERS referrals are directed to the appropriate Consultants and Clinics.
• Responsible for booking all new and follow up appointments in accordance with departmental procedures.
• Liaise directly with patients in relation to booking and agreeing outpatient appointments within the appropriate timescales.
• Working under the direction of the operational management teams, when dealing with requests for clinic cancellations; will be responsible for managing the cancellation/reduction of the clinics on PAS and ERS, and the patient’s future appointments effectively and timely.
• Responsible for all clinic template changes due to changes to Medical Rota’s.
• Manage all appointments on the ERS system ensuring all new appointments which are cancelled by the patient, are discussed with the patient and the appointment either remade or discharged within the appropriate timescales.
• Management of the ASI, ensuring the booking of appointment or escalating capacity issues to the appropriate operational team.
• Responsible for managing partial booking lists and escalating any problems to the operational management teams/team leader.
• Manage all ward forms, ensuring patients are booked for their follow-up appointment or escape as required.
• Retrospectively record all attendances outside clinic as per work instruction.
• On rotation ensure the general access office email address is managed timely during the shift.
• On rotation, allocated duties include answering the access and booking main telephone line for patient queries and booking.
• Ensure compliance with the two week wait rule for all suspected cancer referrals.
• The post holder will be required to undertake mandatory training and is responsible for keeping this training up to date.
• The post holder will have an appraisal of performance each year and will be responsible for agreeing a development plan in line with the Trust’s PDR system in agreement with their manager or immediate supervisor. The development plan will be reviewed each year.
• The Trust will provide assistance and agreed development to enable the post holder to achieve their objectives and standards in line with the development plan.
• If the post holder feels he/she is not achieving their objective as agreed in the development plan they will bring it to the attention of their supervisor or manager at the earliest opportunity.
• Prioritise own workload on a daily basis while recognising when it is appropriate to elevate to manager.
• To understand, contribute, implement and apply knowledge of a relevant procedures and knowledge of how to resolve non-routine problems.
• Assist in the training and induction of new staff and provide continuous support with regards to the co-ordination of their workload.
• Participate in the cover of work colleagues during their absences or at other times when required.
• Required to contribute to service/department meetings giving progress reports on activity for each consultant and reduction of wait times.
• The post holder will support the line manager utilising the proper use of the Trust’s resources such as stationery, telephone usage, photocopying and other consumables in the course of business, ensuring minimal waste and minimal cost.
• Responsible for data quality when maintaining, inputting, extracting and producing information (including information to patients) in the Trust’s multiple computer systems.
• To use speed and accuracy with clinical and non-clinical information relating to patient care to ensure patient safety at all times.
• To work under own initiative within approved policies, procedures, booking guidelines and escalation processes to make decisions to ensure efficient and patient centred service delivery.
• To attend weekly meetings with the operational team to provide information for the access meetings and also to discuss any capacity issues/shortfalls and contribute to help identify a solution.
• Responsible for the generation and sending of all letters and appropriate information leaflets, for both paper and electronic referrals booked through PAS and the ERS System and for partial booking invites.
• To understand, contribute, implement and apply knowledge of a relevant procedures and knowledge of how to resolve non-routine problems.
• Proactively engage with clinicians/GP’s/staff and patients to enable an effective patient flow through the pathway.
• Receive and handle patient telephone enquiries in an empathic, reassuring, timely, appropriate and confident manner.
• To overcome barriers on a daily basis in supporting patients that might not easily understand due to cultural or language differences, physical or mental special needs, or due to age. To use tact and persuasion to negotiate a mutually convenient date for a patients’ procedure when the may be upset or angry.
• To communicate unpleasant news in a empathetic manner to patients, relative or carers over the telephone and provide reassurance at times of distress or when discussing issues of a sensitive nature.
• Prioritise own workload on a daily basis while recognising when it is appropriate to elevate to manager.
• To understand, contribute, implement and apply knowledge of a relevant procedures and knowledge of how to resolve non-routine problems.
• Assist in the training and induction of new staff and provide continuous support with regards to the co-ordination of their workload.
• Participate in the cover of work colleagues during their absences or at other times when required.
• Required to contribute to service/department meetings giving progress reports on activity for each consultant and reduction of wait times.

Qualifications

• ECDL or equivalent
• NVQ 2 Customer Care or equivalent experience
• NVQ 3 Business and Administration

Knowledge & Experience

• Computer literate – experience of using Microsoft packages
• Working within a multidisciplinary team
• Experience of working in a customer service environment
• Excellent communication skills to overcome barriers of understanding
• Experience of collating data
• Working in a demanding environment
• Ability to organise self, working to deadlines and ensuring quality standards
• Use of patient administrative systems
• Experience of scheduling / coordination activities and/or resources.
• Knowledge of NHS standards and targets
• Communication with patients in a healthcare setting

Skills

• Excellent organisational skills
• Able to work under pressure & to strict deadlines
• Able to work effectively across departmental boundaries
• Demonstrate effective written, verbal and telephone communication skills with team/clients/relatives, using tact when required
• Demonstrate knowledge of dealing with public/conflict
• Demonstrate a caring manner with an understanding disposition
• High standard of accuracy
• Flexibility and able to adapt to change
• Ability to work as a flexible and effective team member

Other

• To frequently sit and concentrate in a restricted position for a substantial proportion of the working time due to continuous exposure to VDU equipment, inputting information via a keyboard and using a telephone headset. Whilst using multiple computer systems at the same time.
• To multi-task between activities with frequent interruptions and a need to leave one task immediately. Reprioritise your workload to resolve any unexpected issues
• Ability to concentrate when taking patient details over the phone throughout the day
• Requirement to deal with distressed patients on a daily basis
• Working in an office environment, using a VDU continuously throughout the day

Our values

• We are Kind
• We are Open
• We are Inclusive

Thank you for considering an application to work for Mersey West Lancashire NHS Trust. MWL is an exciting and forward-thinking NHS Trust who are one of the best places to work for in England.

Given sometimes we receive a high volume of applications to work for us, please be aware, that we may close a vacancy earlier than stated should a sufficient number of applications be received from which a shortlist can be confirmed. Therefore, you are advised to apply at your earliest convenience.

The Trust may contact you during the recruitment process for your feedback on your experience. We always aim for continuous improvement in our practice.

Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion

We actively cultivate a professional environment of fairness, equality, dignity, and respect for all individuals. We welcome individuals from all backgrounds and value the unique skills, perspective and experience you bring. We are grounded in the belief that diversity enhances our collective strength, fostering innovation and excellence within our workforce. We welcome all applications irrespective of people’s race, disability, gender, sexual orientation, religion/belief, age, gender identity, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy/maternity and in particular those from under- represented groups.

As a Disability Confident Leader, we commit to offering an interview to all disabled applicants who meet the minimum criteria for the job (the essential criteria) listed in the personal specification. If you wish to apply under this Guaranteed Interview Scheme, please indicate this on the online application form.

If you are having difficulty completing an online application, or require any disability reasonable adjustments, to the application process, please contact [e-mail]

We also commit to offering an interview to all armed forces veterans who meet the minimum criteria for the job (the essential criteria) listed in the personal specification. If you wish to apply under this Guaranteed Interview Scheme, please indicate this on the online application form.

The Trust operates anonymous shortlisting where no personal information about you, including your name or personal details are shared with the recruiting manager. No equality information is shared at any time during the recruitment process with the recruiting manager or other people involved in the decision-making process.

The equality monitoring information you provide is used in the following situations: to review our recruitment practices; where a job is limited to a specific person to verify their eligibility to apply; and to offer disability reasonable adjustments to the recruitment process.
Certificate of Sponsorship

eVisa Update
For successful candidates on selected work and study visa routes, who have completed and paid for their applications will no longer receive a visa vignette in passport as evidence of their permission to enter the UK.
Instead, you will be issued with an eVisa only, which is accessed by creating a UKVI account.
Before travelling to the UK, we advise applicants to:

• Understand how to generate an eVisa share code

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

If this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Please note if applicable, applicants will be required to pay for their DBS check. Costs are deducted from salary following appointment.

If you have not already done so, you are therefore encouraged to enrol for the DBS Update Service to which a small annual fee of £13 per year applies.

Flexible Working

We actively support flexible working patterns throughout MWL. Changes made to the NHS Terms and Conditions of Service Handbook mean that:

• All employees have the right to request flexible working from day one of employment.
• There is no limit on the number of requests they can make.
• Employees have the right to make requests, have them considered, regardless of the reason.

At Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, we will consider requests for flexible working. We would also encourage you to also discuss flexible working options at interview stage.

Working for Team MWL

Staff recognition is especially important to us; as well as performance reviews and appraisals, we recognise staff through Employee of the month. Along with supporting you to achieve your career goals we offer a generous pension scheme, unsocial hours payments (where applicable), 27 days annual leave on commencement (pro rata) and access to a range of NHS discounts. Our Staff Health and Wellbeing programme offer a variety of services.

The Trust is a non-smoking across all our sites. Failure to follow this rule could lead to disciplinary action. For more information, see the Smoke Free NHS website.

You will be expected to undertake the Trusts' commitment to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults.

You must ensure that your application, including personal statements and behaviour examples, are truthful and factually accurate. Please note plagiarism can include presenting the ideas and experience of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own.

The Trust will not accept applications which are found to be AI generated and will check all applications against AI detection software.

Additional Information

Before applying, we encourage you to review the Trusts Values and Behaviours which are We are KIND, We are OPEN, We are INCLUSIVE, which can be found here .

An applicant guide to help and support you with your application and what to expect during your recruitment journey can be accessed in the supporting documents.

Good luck with your application. We hope to welcome you to Team MWL very soon.

Employer certification / accreditation badges

The postholder will have access to vulnerable people in the course of their normal duties and as such this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service to check for any previous criminal convictions.