Downloaded license is insufficient Azure/Visual Studio Online and Visual Studio 2013

Question

90 days ago I formatted my PC and downloaded the trial Pro version on fresh Winblows 7.

It finished and I followed I followed this official guide to buy a user license.

Now I get this notice. (after clicking Check for an updated license) "Downloaded license is insufficient" (Even clicking it 10 thousand times didn't help)

• I cleared IE cache
• I reseter USERdata, unisntalled VS 2013 and used the ISO providedd by VS.COM to reinstall
• The account is definably the correct one I am logging in as.
• Format windows, NO. Why should I? Windows is OK, installed 90 days ago.

The only reason I am asking here is because nobody at Microsoft knows what is going on. Triedthe forums, filed a bug via the support gateway, via the Azure tickets system and I called several technicians and professionals who had no clue. "They still calling me back"- Just ignoring me actually.

I linked my visualstudio.com to Azure AD. Then I could add the Pro VS license to my user. I added alternative login too. I logged the user out and back in. It came up with stupid message, oh, create a free TFS server, choose location? OK, cancelled. And whoopie, downloaded license is invalid. Logged out user, cleared all IE data, devenv /clearuserdata. Logged back in. Welcome! Please login. OK, sorry, downloaded user license is insufficient.

What should I do instead to replace my trial license with a valid license?

Answer 1

In my case I made sure that I took the effort to resole the situation on my own accord in various ways and keep activity logged. Forums, support tickets, chat messages, phone calls.

I declined the 250USD technical support charge since the "Purchase Agreement" was not complete. I got invoiced from Dublin so it falls under the EU distance agreements for online purchases. Not sure about US law.

Under this law it clearly says that if a purchase was made on-line and one of two parties are having troubles and technical support must be free, offered a refund back to bank or option for credit.

So, since my product was not registered, I am not eligible for paid technical support, since I have no product to support. I contacted my bank and the payments for 2 licenses will be disputed and reverted.

Since I am a business customer to MSFT and my Bank I could go ahead and contact my business insurance and claim back days of business loss which currently my rate which works out about £3150 of potential loss of Business. I rather shame them here since since its priceless and will stick around forever.

Microsoft has some serious support issues and lack of talent working on support.

Answer 2

We actually did run into the same problem.

Initially I contacted Azure support (paid for that) but they couldn't help me (out of scope for Azure). The support engineer was however so kind to send me another link for Visual Studio support: http://www.visualstudio.com/en-us/support/cloud-services-assisted-support-vs. That link actually didn't work the first day but did work one day later. So i admit I was initially frustrated with support.

However, through this link (the next day) I could submit my problem. I got an answer 8 hours later with an answer that helped me to solve the problem right away.

The answer is the following:

The user needs to install and then sign in to that VS PRO using the same email that was assigned the license in the VSO users hub. The user also needs to make a choice as to how to log in\license: OrgID or Microsoft account (MSA). The correct choice will depend on whether the VSO account is backed by Azure Active Directory. If it is, the user should use the OrgID option. Otherwise, use MSA.

However be carefull. If you click organisational account in “License with another Microsoft or Organisation account” you are directed to a window in which the domiant part are the login control to a Microsfot account. You might actuall get the remakr that your account doesn't exist. You first have to click "Sign in with your Organisation account" on the left hand side of the window.

Than everything worked smoothly.

The local license got refreshed indicating the monthly subscription (Internet connection needed of course). It said something “expires in 30 days”, which is expected because it’s a monthly subscription. As long as you keep paying your Azure bill though and you have an internet connection to refresh the license, you will continue to have the VS 2013 IDE.

That said: we applies this procedure 3 months ago as well and then it didn't work. At that time we read on Sign in to Visual Studio with Organization account instead Microsoft account that it was actually not possible (yet) with organisational account.

So I assume in the meantime some improvements were made.