Permission Error - Word - Mac

Question

I cannot Open or Save a Word file. I get a message that says

WORD CANNOT SAVER DUE TO A FILRE PERMISSION ERROR.

I am on a Mac and running the most current version of Microsoft office.

I reinstalled Office as well.

Answer 1

Your response does not apply to my situation. I have an M1 Macbook pro running Monterey OS. I purchased MS Office 2021 home and student edition so that I could use office offline and not have big huge pauses whenever I go to save a document. Whenever I have word documents open for a few days and just put my computer to sleep at night word develops amnesia and starts giving me the message above right when I am in the middle of writing reports with 10-20 word documents open across two 38" ultra wide monitors. Whenever this happens I have to close all of my documents and restart my computer which causes a lot of down time and interrupts my workflow.

I have already set all of my permissions so that ANYONE logging into my computer has access and permissions to view everything on my hard drive and open and modify any application.

Please advise a permanent fix. I don't want to restart word every time it decides to act like an 80 year old alzheimer's patient.

Answer 2

I am having the same issue. Same exact error messages on saving a file and/or trying to open an existing file. Any updates on a fix?

Answer 3

Hello,

I cannot open or save documents. I have followed the steps given previously with no change.

I have a mac with Ventura Version 13.4.1 (c) (22F770820d)

I have reinstalled Office 365, updated it, updated my account credentials, my password, etc., rebooted, etc
.

still, I am back to Google docs Lol! :)

Answer 4

Dear Todd,

I understand, you received error “Word cannot complete the save due to a file permission error”, right? Generally, this error is caused when:

• You don’t have privileges to write on to a volume or folder on Mac
• If the file privileges are set to read-only
• Damaged template or damaged Excel file

If you still have issues saving the Office files on the certain location, please follow the steps below, see if this helps you save the file:

1. Ensure Office 365/2019 for mac apps updated to the latest version 16.72 (23040900).
2. For this, choose Check For Update from the Help menu in any Office Application.
3. Remove Microsoft ADAL keychain entries (search for ADAL in the keychain and remove those items)
4. Remove the securebookmarks preference files:

• Press Command+Shift+G again and then paste in the following.

~/Library/Containers/ Microsoft Word /Data/Library/Preferences/

• Within this folder remove the following file

Microsoft Word.securebookmarks.plist

After the above steps, please reboot your machine (manually removing preferences and keychain items does not guarantee they will be recreated properly unless you restart).

Also, please try repairing mac disk errors with Disk Utility

***Disclaimer:***Microsoft provides no assurances and/or warranties, implied or otherwise, and is not responsible for the information you receive from the third-party linked sites or any support related to technology.

If you need any help, let us know. We will look forward to your reply.

Sincerely,

Neha | Microsoft Community Moderator

Answer 5

Hi

Make sure both Mac OS and Office are up to date. The screen management is done by Mac OS but both Mac OS and Office have to be up to date to be in synch with each other.

Use the Menu Bar in Word and choose Microsoft Word > About Microsoft Word. The current update is 16.79 or 16.80.

Mac OS 14.1.1 is buggy. If that's what you have, wait till 14.2 comes out and then test again.