I had a few similar problems when I signed up with Internode. Telstra had to reconnect our line to a RIM, and when they did, they obviously didn’t reprogram the line card, so we had someone else’s number. I called up Telstra, and they fixed that pretty quickly for us - I was impressed with how fast they fixed it, actually. Then I was able to sign up with Internode, but they rejected it the next morning with no specific reason. I called up and asked why, they pretty much straight away were able to tell me there was an unresolved fault on the line. I call up Telstra again, explained what happened, and they removed the fault. Reapplied with Internode, had line sync the next morning.

So that was 2 days to connect the ADSL line, including getting the fault removed. Much faster than I expected really.

I also had some problems paying my Internode bill recently which resulted in the service getting suspended. I paid the amount I owed the next day, called them up and explained what happened, and they re-activated my account temporarily until the payment went through. A nice surprise after the “tough shit” attitude I’d probably get from Telstra or Optus.

I’ve avoided the larger companies internet offerings because the value is so abysmal it brings tears to my eyes, so I can’t comment in that respect, but I can’t remember the last time that I heard anything good about both Optus and Bigpond.