Should I be annoyed? - Vets.

[WelshD]

I don't think it helped this year with Christmas eve and new years eve falling on a Monday.

Most businesses I deal with on a daily basis closed on the 21st and don't reopen till tomorrow, if you tag on the two mondays to holiday days you get a decent break and that's what a lot of staff around the country will have done

 

[Aru]

Edited to addn...just reread the O.P looks like it could be that they were literally in emergency surgery...in that case the half hour wait makes more sense.

As for working a skeleton crew..sometimes it has to be done..
if it's a one in two practice then that means each vet and depending on the vet nurse rota they will be oncall as well... working every second night and every second weekend....with holidays having to be covered as well....so they will not have gotten Xmas eve, Xmas day, boxing day..etc off..one of the two will have covered them...quite likely that both worked over xmas....so to make some family time etc new years gets treated like a holiday as well. At least in my practice anyway maybe the u.k is different