What kind of office--government or otherwise--puts you ON HOLD and has messages encouraging that you wait--for 25 or so minutes and then announces, essentially, "we're too busy" and hangs up?

Counting all the times I called, including when I got hung up on while on hold (twice), I was on hold for a total of 2 hrs 56 minutes. Only to eventually get thru to get given the wrong information (told I needed to go down to the building in person, which is only partly correct). What I ultimately did was go downtown to the actual building, get the direct office number from a kindly officer (which is different than the one I found for the office online) and called THAT number right when they opened. There, I waited on hold about 35 minutes, and finally got the correct info and turns out I didn't need to do any of the things the prior person I talked to told me I needed to do but actually just confirm some other info and then I could just have the forms mailed to me. After all that, still haven't received the forms but at least I have their actual number now. Look, set a day aside, and pour yourself a drink, cause this'll take a while and you'll definitely need one by the end of it.

The service is terrible I agree. What I've seen work is if you call right when the office hours begins ~9am. Fax also works.