"Had an appointment booked in a couple of weeks..."

Had an appointment booked in a couple of weeks before said date. Had a phone call at 10:25am to cancel appointment at 11:15am because doctor was on annual leave, by which time I was already on my way to Leicester, so was wasted journey. Would have been better to have been told a little bit earlier. Had a letter come through to book an appointment but I can't make it keep trying to ring up to cancel it, but none of the telephone numbers seem to get through to anybody so this appointment slot will probably just get missed as I can't get through to anyone to cancel!