Office 365 Troubleshooting: propertyNotSettableException

Introduction

While trying to set the password policy for a user in Office 365:

Set-MsolUser –UserPrincipalName user@domain.com –PasswordNeverExpires $ False

Following error occurs

Set-MsolUser : Unable to update parameter. Parameter name: PasswordPolicies.

At line:1 char:13

+ Set-MsolUser <<<< -UserPrincipalName jsmith@contoso.com

-PasswordNeverExpires $true

+ CategoryInfo : OperationStopped: ( : ) [Set-MsolUser], MicrosoftOnlineException

+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : Microsoft.Online.Administration.Automation.PropertyNotSettableException, Microsoft.Online.Administration.Automation.SetUser

The error is because the domain is federated and the passwords for SSO-enabled users are managed in the on-premises environment.

Note

Only passwords for user accounts that are not synchronized through directory synchronization can be configured to never expire.