Thank you so much for all taking the time to reply. What a range of experiences!

I can't really believe we have to put up with such poor service from all of our choices of phone providers. Looks like they are all as bad as each other at worst.

I am glad to hear of some good experiences and hope that those of you with bad experiences feel just a bit better for having vented! I am grateful for the heads up. Sadly, I have similar experiences to some of you with Optus... Arrrgh!

Phew, not really any closer to knowing what to do, but I am pleased to hear of the Vodafone merge/Telstra tower use...