I've been with NTL for a good while now and am preparing to going back to BT in the new year. I've recently moved house and the telephone extensions are fairly straightforward, namely:

3 extensions of the NTL master socket.
2 seem to be independant of the master socket (not traced the wires outside yet, but they probably go back to the brown wall box).

There is a BT junction box on the inside wall, but there does not appear to be a line into the house; it's probably been disconnected at some point.

My questions are:

1) Will BT be helpful and remove all existing NTL sockets (I think I already know the answer to this, i.e. they will not touch them). If not, can I remove the master socket? I don't really want any redundant sockets in the house.
2) Will they be equally helpful and reconnect any spurs off the current master socket?
3) What about the two independant ones? Will they reconnect them?
4) If there is no line in and work needs to be done, is there any way of blagging them a free line or a discount? I'm technically coming back to BT (but after a 7-8 year spell with NTL).

Finally, probably not the best forum to post this in, but what the heck, once the line is provisioned, I'll be ordering ADSL. What kind of distance can I run the ADSL modem from the master phone socket? I'm thinking I'll need a run of cable about 3-4 meters to get it into the study (although I could drill a hole in the wall and get it down to 1m).

I don't really want to go down the route of contacting BT yet, as I'll only get a sales monkey that'll tell me anything for a reconnect. I want some real-life experiences to assure (or prepare) me! Thanks!!

Both NTL and BT won't touch each others equipment. You do occasionally get engineers who will switch extensions over for a bung, this will be the best way to get any extensions reconnected. Doing it officially costs a lot more, so just hope you get someone friendly and who doesn't have too many jobs on their sheet for that day.

Any unused extensions you can remove. Any master sockets you must leave, and only an engineer may disconnect these. If you do have them disconnected, then you will have to pay for a new installation rather than the (usually free) reconnection. Although the socket will be made inactive, technically it's still connected to their network and you can be charged for any damage - customer or not.

There's no way I'm aware of getting a discounted or free line other than very exceptional circumstances (which isn't often at all - I'd say at a straw guess 1 in every 100). I'm not sure, but this used to be £125 for an install.

You'll have no problem with that length of cable for ADSL, you'd have to add a couple of zeros on the end of your numbers before it became an issue.

If you have the BT socket put next to the NTL master, BT(openreach) will swing over any extensions from that master socket free of charge but they will not check if the extensions work. BT will not touch or should not touch any wires from the brown box outside.

Thanks, guys. I'll probably leave the ones directly connected to the brown box for the moment; may call NTL out (if I can be bothered) to disconnect them at some point, or "accidentally" cut the wires

I think I can manage to reconnect the extensions; it's not the knowledge, just the wire runs (some of it is under laminated wooden flooring); to be honest will probably do a better job than the last guy; there are three cables going into the master socket spur so it's a bit packed in there. I will probably get a junction box and then just run a single wire from that into the spur.

I'll give BT a call in the new year to sort it out; am quite happy to pay the reconnection fee but may still try to push for a free reconnect. You don't get if you don't ask!

I'll also get the master socket put in the study; that way I can keep the ADSL modem close to the socket and also my DECT cordless base.

If you cut the NTL cable, I have had second hand experiences of them charging people for being reconnected - so if you ever want to go back, it'll cost you, even if you argue it's nothing to do with you. My advice is leave it in place, it's not doing any harm and you may need it in the future.

Someone would ever consider going back to cable for telephony?

They'd have to have won the lottery to even consider such a thing.

Thankfully, I've just checked and the two independant sockets are connected to the brown box; but like this:

brown box->junction box (inside bedroom wall) -> socket 1 -> spur to socket 2

So I can just rewire the junction box to the BT network if necessary and leave the NTL one trailing. Or if I decide to get rid, leave NTL connected to junction box and just strip out inside sockets. Everyone's a winner!