TalkTalk Support - unrivalled incompetence

[Simonrwindsor]

I ordered TalkTalk broadband early June and was soon up and running with the international calling package. However I have yet to get my 'free' broadband service and have to say everything Nildram, my previous ISP, told me has been proven to be correct.
I had to request a MAC code from my ISP on 3 occassions, the 1st two codes were either ignored or not processed within the requisite 30 days. Had I known how time consuming and frustrating it would be to move to TalkTalk, I would have heeded their advice and stayed put with a perfectly good service at £16 quid a month.
I have now been without broadband at home now for 3 weeks. They promised my ADSL service would be activated on 8th Nov while I was away on holiday. On my return, no broadband. I was then promised it would be available Monday 13th. Last week was truly a week of hell.
Monday, still nothing. Service not activated, wait 24 hours.
Tuesday, problem at the exchange, should be fixed in 24-48.
Wednesday, problem at the exchange still not fixed.
Thursday, my password needed to change, another 24 hour wait.
Saturday I spent most of the morning berating their Customer Services, this time an English acent - hurrah, but equally useless. She gave me a set of IP addresses different to those published on their support site. They could not provide support for my Dlink wireless router as it is not supplied by them. When I ordered the service, if you're switching from another ISP YOU DON'T GET THE OPTION!!. How f***ing annoying is that? I retreated to a local pub that offered free WiFi to calm my nerves and scour the message boards. Several subscribers reported their accounts were not registered on the TT servers.
Sunday, called the TT support idiots again and relayed this information, asking them to confirm my account was set up, they assured me it was, despite my router diagnostics telling me otherwise,

Finally Sunday evening there appeared to be a breakthough. In sheer exasperation I called their support again and finally got through to someone in India who seemed to know what they were talking about. He gave me a different set of IP addresses, primary DNS 62.24.199.13, secondary 62.24.199.23. After changing my router settings I got Passes on all the Diagnostic checks, but still Idle status on the ADSL line. This indicated no activity on the ADSL line. Today, a full week after my revised live date, finally TT support admitted my account was not registered, after repeated denials this was the problem. Cretins the lot of them; and, you've guessed it, I have to wait another 24 hours for my account to be set up. So, tomorrow, I may finally get TT broadband after a 5 month wait. Will it be worth it? I'll have to wait and see, on past experience probably not.

Observations:
1. TT have not trained their agents to a level where they can provide the necessary technical answers.
2. TT should work with eg. Belkin, Linksys, DLink to come up with configuration profiles for these popular routers.
3. Their support webite is useless, difficult to navigate and has inaccurate information, e.g. IP addresses.
4. The technical information TT agents appear to have access to is at best out of date and not updated with experience of solving customer problems
5 I suspect TalkTalk support staff are incentivised based on number of calls handled, not on customer satisfaction, hence the general fobbing off of customers.
Finally, does anyone know if Ofcom vet the performance of ISPs providing ADSL and can they withdraw their licence if they fail to meet standards? On TT's current performance, ie bottom of the pile, they would be a candidate.