Several questions, mostly regarding character transfer

[worldofneil]

As far as I know, once deleted the name becomes available immediately (assuming name isn't now on the banned list as mentioned above). I have no first hand experience of this though, just what I've seen people say. May want to give it at least a few minutes just to be sure. Possibly check the mogstation too. Once that's all updated/it's gone from there it should be safe in game (in theory!).

And yes the people who transfer and are forced to change still are because the check for the name is done at the point of the transfer, not when you try and login after transfer. Once a name change operation has been triggered on a character it can't be aborted, even if the name you have is still available (and it will make you change, can't try and save the same name).