Hard Drive Replacement and Microsoft Packages Renewal

Question

Going back a couple of years I had a problem with my quite expensive laptop so took it to a local IT company to fix. They said it needed a new hard drive so put one in. But I seemed to have lost my Microsoft package with it.

Is this right or is it because my Microsoft account does not recognise it is the 'same' computer? Or has it simply expired? However I used to be able to use basic functions now it will not even save an existing file as a word document?

Answer 1

You should be able to reinstall Office via your account at https://account.microsoft.com/services .

Depending on the type of license, you may run into activation issues. Typically, if you have a one-time payment license such as Office Home 2024, the new hard drive will make the activation servers at Microsoft think that you have a new device. That is why you need to reactivate. See if https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/activation/activate-microsoft-perpetual-products-using-the-product-activation-portal helps. Sometimes, you have to contact the chat support via https://support.microsoft.com/contactus for further assistance.

On the other hand, a subscription license should reactivate immediately.

Answer 2

It depends on the type of Office licence you have, if you did not purchase Office separately to the PC and Office was pre-installed on the PC, that may be a subscription to Microsoft 365 that may have expired or a standalone version of Office like Office 2021 or 2024.

Log into your Microsoft account on this link, what Office licence or subscription do you find listed there, and if that is a subscription, does the expiry date indicate the subscription has expired.

https://account.microsoft.com/services/