seller handed it over, agent hasn't received it

Seller supplied a local collection reference. Agent supplied the warehouse booking. Neither message links the numbers, and the seller's screenshot has no crate mark visible.

Ask the seller to connect its collection record to the warehouse booking and your crate mark. I'd put both contacts in one existing exchange so you aren't translating two vague answers back and forth.

They now say the local carrier took it to a holding yard, not the agent's warehouse. The original handed over wording left out that extra stop.

Ours spent several days at a yard while the onward truck was arranged. I kept the installers off site until someone could give us a real arrival date. Can you postpone that booking without much cost?

No installers booked yet, thankfully. I've told production not to clear the manual station based on the seller's earlier estimate.

Can I ask whether the yard has confirmed it holds your marked crate? All the location information still seems to be coming from the seller.

Yes, a receipt from whoever has it now would settle much more than another shipment screenshot. Did they give you the yard contact?

Any confirmation from the yard yet?

Yard sent a receipt and photograph matching our crate mark. The cable package is listed with it. Onward transport remains unbooked, so we have a location now but still no arrival estimate.