Sorry, we are having some temporary server issues

Question

Greetings,

around a week ago my Office 365 desktop apps started acting strange. They were asking me to log into my account despite the fact that I was already logged in, and upon clicking "Log in" they all returned the following error: "Sorry we are having temporary server issues". Sure enough, retrying didn't help. Note that I've been using Office 365 for a very long time without any problems whatsoever beforehand.

I have Office 365 A1 Plus for students subscription active.

Here are the methods I've tried to fix this error:

• Waiting a week to see if this isn't indeed just a server issue
• Logging out of my account on Office 365 desktop apps. This didn't change anything - Office still greeted me with that same window asking me to log in and that same error appeared upon trying to.
• Resetting browser settings via Control Panel in Windows.
• Clearing cookies and browser history in the current browser I'm using (Firefox)
• Fully uninstalling the entire Office 365 package and installing it again using the official Office 365 installer which I downloaded from my account panel at portal.office.com
• Changing network to an entirely different one (mobile Internet)
• Using VPN
• Emailing the helpdesk administrator at my university. He offered a variety of possible fixes but ultimately concluded that the problem was on my side (i.e. not related to my Microsoft student account)

I should specifically point out that I *can*, in fact, log into office.com and use web versions of all Office products without any problem whatsoever.

As my student account is not really the same as a general Microsoft account, I can't even contact an agent at Microsoft tech support, since it asks me to log in, and I can't do that with my student account on microsoft.com, only on office.com.

Please help. I'm literally one step short of doing a clean Windows reinstallation. Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Hi,

Thanks for providing the information with us.

It seems that you are required to log into your account although you've already logged in, and you also tried logging out, resetting browser settings, clearing cookies, uninstalling and reinstalling Office and etc while still cannot solve this issue.

Given the situation, please try to clear the Office credentials and see if it works for you:

1)Quit all Office applications.

2)Clear Office credentials:

a. Type control panel at Windows search bar and open Control Panel.

b. Select User Accounts> Manage Windows Credentials> Delete credentials which contains “Microsoft Office”.

3)Open any Office application (Such as Word)> File> Account> sign in with your Office account.

If clear credentials still can’t help, please try to run Online Repairand Safe Mode to see if it helps resolve the issue. 

Regarding to your issue, I’ve searched a lot, please temporarily turn off any firewall or proxy to see the result.

If the above suggestions still cannot work, please capture a screenshot of your Office version. (click File> Account> capture the full Production information page here.)

 

And the screenshot of the error message is highly appreciated.

Any updates are welcomed to let us know, we are willing to further help.

Best regards，

Gloria

Answer 2

Hi,

Thanks for letting us know the above information, to better troubleshoot and investigate your issue, we need to collect some information in PM, you can share with us.

Appreciate your cooperation again. 

Best regards,

Gloria

Answer 3

Hi Gloria,

thank you for your reply. Unfortunately, none of your suggested methods worked. In the meantime I've also contacted a friend of mine who works as an administrator and he suggested that Office 365 might be checking my location to see if I'm currently in the country of my university. Due to the pandemic I've temporarily went back home to another country, so he thought Office 365 might have noticed that and denied me connection. I've tried a VPN connection to the country of my university, but that didn't help.

As per your request, I'm posting the screenshots.

That error screen appears upon clicking "Sign in".

Answer 4

Hi,

Thanks for posting back. From your screenshot, we notice that your Office is unlicensed, please check if this article helps you solve the problem:Unlicensed Product and activation errors in Office

If the issue remains, please provide a full screenshot of your Office 365 subscription page.

Hope everything goes well.

Best regards,

Gloria

Answer 5

Hi Gloria,

sure enough it is unlicensed, as I logged off and reinstalled Office 365! As I've already explained, the issue is that I can't log in because of the error.

Here is the subscription page screenshot. I'm sorry it's in Russian, but I don't have the language setting in the Settings menu in the top right corner to change it. I would also like to not publicly post my full unique identifier.