They will do anything to fight this. And I am mostly at their side in this particular issue.
One specialist I've had to go to frequently has a very good system.
An SMS 3 days before as a reminder. Another the day of, which you reply to to check in.
When they're ready for you, they text back, and you go in, and the nurse meets you at the door. (Even ignoring Covid, I'd much rather wait in my car, my with choice of tunes cranked, etc).
That's all good in and of itself.
What makes it really good is that someone human actually reads those messages and dispatches them as appropriate. So whenever I've had a billing question, need a refill, have a question for my doc whatever... I just text that number, and if it's during normal business hours I usually get a response back within 5-10 minutes. (And actual response, not "You are very important to us, we will return your call within 48 hours")
https://blog.curogram.com/what-are-tcpa-and-traced-act-and-h...
- An SMS confirming my appointment.
- An SMS the day before reminding me of the appointment.
- An SMS the morning of the appointment inviting me to checkin.
- An SMS after I left asking me about my experience on a scale of 1-5.
That's four SMSs relating to one appointment/visit. The moment I read this post I could just imagine a similar situation - I make a reservation online for a table, and I'll get spammed indefinitely about offers, and invitations to leave a review.