please don't go in to the office until you've spoken to someone over the phone! offices are often very busy and hard to get someone who can spend the time you need with them - the staff in the offices will often send you to a phone within the office to make a phone call - talk to the call centre staff. yes, it can take a bit of time to get through (often less than standing in the queue at the office though) - but once you have someone on the phone, they can go through everything with you - they are able to spend as much time with you as needed and will only send you to the office if there is a need for you to attend. there is no point leaving home, trekking to the office, standing in a queue, getting to the counter to be told "oh, you need to supply this" then having to go, find "this", trek back in and do it all again.

the offices are contact points for making claims, interviews, handing in forms. they are not set up to deal with enquiries - the staff have a queue to deal with and they will send you to enquire via the call centre for most things - the don't have time to be looking into stuff - they take forms, process them, and move to the next person.

the call centres should always be your first port of call for enquiries