Well I received my 'Welcome pack' on Friday which is a nice booklet containing my account information, contract details, product information, go-live dates etc. No other contact from TalkTalk as of yet, so nothing's gone wrong yet!

I did have to lodge a missing cashback claim today though as it hasn't appeared in my account even after waiting 7 days. Apparently I should hear about the end result of that in the next few weeks.

The router still hasn't been dispatched (I go live on Friday as well) so I queried it over Live chat. They told me there had been a system error when they attempted to send it originally (why was I not informed?) so they are dispatching one as a matter of priority (hopefully).

Starting to think I'm gonna regret this...

Normally, routers are not dispatched until literally 1-2 days before your go live date, so I wouldn't worry too much just yet. Hopefully your conversation on live chat is not going to trigger a problem.

The chat advisor seems to have helped, the router has been dispatched.

Here's the events from yesterday...

1st live chat session (the one I mentioned).

A 2nd live chat session in order to confirm there was no longer an issue and my router would be delivered. This advisor said there isn't an issue with the router order, but also said there never was - don't know who to believe. We also went round in circles regarding delivery time, I asked how long and he said 3-5 working days, I asked when will it be dispatched and he said 3-5 working days again.

3rd came a call to the order team. The guy said the router had been sent, but said there wasn't a tracking number.

Although happy that my router had been dispatched, the differing answers I was getting were giving me a bad feeling.

So, the 4th thing I did was to call the orders team again, I asked to speak to the Loyalty Team (as I know they are in this country), who confirmed dispatch again. I forgot to ask for my tracking number though.

So my 5th and final action was registering for the Members Forums, where an OCE confirmed dispatch and provided the holy tracking number.

I'm glad I now know the fate of the router. Anyone know what postage TalkTalk use to send routers nowadays (what class)?

Try entering your tracking number on http://www.royalmail.com/trackdetails - this usually gives more details, as the parcel progresses along its journey, than the regular tracking checker. Last I heard, they were using "Royal Mail Tracked", although I don't remember if it was the 24 or 48 hour service.

Did you also try logging into your TT account? They used to put the tracking number and dispatch information there - not sure if they still do.

Indeed the confusion caused by the differing replies doesn't inspire confidence. I'm inclined to believe your router was always going to be dispatched today for delivery tomorrow (or Friday). So, no need to worry. The time to start panicking would be if it didn't turn up on Friday. There are always horror stories going around, but in the majority of cases things go perfectly smoothly.

Thanks for the link. It's had 'Outward RDC Volumetric Acceptance' at 'Princess Royal Distribution Centre'. Anyone know what this means?

I've checked the 'Order tracker' in My Account, where the tracking number should be but it hasn't changed since I first ordered. It still indicates the router not yet being dispatched.

Probably means it has left London and is on its way to you. The tracking will hopefully show something more meaningful tomorrow. Obviously, can't read too much into your delivery date until your local mail centre is showing in the tracking, but you'll probably see something more useful there tomorrow, if not later this evening.

It arrived earlier and it's a nice looking piece of kit.

Got to wait until tomorrow to plug it in though!

Edit: slipped my mind, the cr*ppy 'Order tracker' still hasn't got with the times

Edited by deleted (Thu 30-May-13 15:49:27)

Everything actually went well today

A BT Openreach engineer showed up at around 10:30, nice chap. We had a chat about broadband-ish stuff while he changed me over - he was as frustrated and confused as me with TalkTalk's inability to retain Sky numbers, or lines. There was a lot of specialist looking devices involved in the switch and he even had to move some stuff around in the cabinet.

He also installed a brand new master socket for me free of charge, it's the latest one (Openreach branded) and he even threw in an Openreach filtered ADSL faceplate, so I'm all kitted out with the latest stuff.

Here's my throughput speed currently: http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/results.html...

My stats are:
ADSL (Sync) Summary
System uptime: 4:08:39
Modem ADSL (Sync) uptime: 1:20:48
Interleaving: On
ADSL mode: ADSL2+
ADSL settings: PVC:0/38
ADSL line speed (kbps): up 846 down 14576
Line attentuation (dB): up 11.1 down 19.0
SN margin (dB): up 15.5 down 14.5
Total errors seconds: 1

Will post follow-ups when the line settles.

Also, just seen about TalkTalk going totally unlimited. Will this include people who joined before this announcement, like me?

Hope those stats compare well to your old Sky line? Glad things went smoothly and I hope what the BTOR engineer said was free actually is . Have seens lots of bad stories about engineer charges, but I guess you should be ok on a new line install.

Not really sure what that "Totally Unlimited" thing is all about - TT's attempt to compete with BT's "will not slow you down" promise, I presume. Not that BT are telling the truth - because their connections do slow down on congested exchanges and at peak times. Likewise for TT too, but less so in my experience. Probably most users will not notice any difference between "Unlimited" and "Totally Unlimited" anyway. I don't really recall being affected by traffic management myself - my connection's throughput always seems to be as fast as the sync speed. My guess that the removal of traffic management will apply to existing customers too.