Sooo what's going on?

Fortunately my pre-order was late so it appears the devs had already swapped the codes to associate them with the correct DLC as they were the wrong way around.

However when I try to redeem my academy competition code I get nowhere. I suspect this is because I'll be redeeming it nearer the time but I'd like to make sure that's the case.

You think they'd give you a little hint in the box but nothin. Just the generic code slip

The Academy competition is over I think, so maybe that's why. My thing with the DLC code was that a few things like the complete pack were on the disc. So you redeem those by selecting the red DLC button on the right in the main menu.