Well according to the engineer, ISPs rent a number of ports in the cab, necessitating a move of cabling. He said in this instance the cable had been jumpered to BT but hadn't been disconnected from Vodafone.

What a Jackanory!

Well it's now working & he had nothing to gain from lying...

Yes, you would be moved to a new fibre port in the pcp with a change of provider. The old one you had Vodafone on, will be turned off and then become free for future use by another customer when required.

In reply to a post by witchunt:

What a Jackanory!

You seem to have forgotten to post your explanation?

Any moves from FTTC suppliers i've had from BT Wholesale ones or TTB backhaul have all been switched over just after midnight so unless we have engineers visiting cabs at 0:24am and 3am then there is no 'physical' work done as far as my cases.

In reply to a post by jdigz7:

Any moves from FTTC suppliers i've had from BT Wholesale ones or TTB backhaul have all been switched over just after midnight so unless we have engineers visiting cabs at 0:24am and 3am then there is no 'physical' work done as far as my cases.

This is my experience as well.

????

Not always, sometimes just the current port is reconfigured remotely.

In reply to a post by TheInstaller:

Yes, you would be moved to a new fibre port in the pcp with a change of provider. The old one you had Vodafone on, will be turned off and then become free for future use by another customer when required.

That's certainly not the standard procedure. A switch of supplier requires no visit to the cabinet. OpenReach remotely reconfigure the existing port, usually in the middle of the night.

The OP seems to have had issues with his port being reassigned. In this situation the engineer will have called the DCOE, who probably configured a free port and the engineer rejumpered the line to the new port.

He then went to the OPs property and blurted out a bunch of "Utter and absolute hog-wash" about ISP's renting a set number of ports.
Can you imagine the issues that would cause?
If you wanted to switch ISP you may only have the choice of a single provider as everyone else has used all their ports.