Outlook is not bright

In response to “Is this XP user a thief or a customer?” Bill wrote with his own frustrating problem with Microsoft. “My company buys 10 Office Enterprise licenses at a time. And the remote staff are responsible for installing the software,” he wrote from his home office. “The main office sent me Office Enterprise 2007, so I could upgrade from Office XP 2000.”

He dutifully followed the installation instructions, and — as instructed — saved his personal preferences and files to a PST file. Then he uninstalled the old version of Office 2000 and installed his new Office 2007 Enterprise Edition.

“After I rebooted,” he explains, “I opened Outlook to set it up and check that my addresses and files were intact. I was asked to verify my copy by Internet. Imagine my surprise when the program refused to run and asked me to call for a new product key.”

[ Previously on Gripe Line, a Microsoft customer went through a similar ordeal: “Is this XP user a thief or a customer?” | Frustrated by your tech support? You’re not alone. Get answers in InfoWorld’s Gripe Line newsletter. ]

He phoned technical support to do just that. And that’s where his troubles began. “I was told I had an invalid copy of Office 2007,” he says, “and was refused a product key.”

This was an automated response, so Bill asked to speak to a human representative. “She told me that the copy had been used too many times. So I checked with the home office. They do keep track of such things! They said only six of the ten copies they purchased had been used.”

Bill was unable to access his e-mail or any of the files stored in that PST file, which left him unable to accomplish much of anything. “I decided to buy a new copy of Office — out of my own pocket — because I am not earning any money while Microsoft fiddles around figuring this out. I bought a boxed copy of Microsoft Office Standard 2007.”

This was aggravatingly expensive. But it should’ve fixed it, right?

“After installation,” says Bill, “the program looked for a previous PST file and attempted to load it. The new program announced that the old PST file was too large and refused to allow Outlook to start! I renamed the old file and tried again, but the damage is already done. It will not allow it.”

Desperate now, Bill called Microsoft support for help again. “Someone in India informed me that it will cost $137 for help getting my four-hour-old Office suite to work.” Bill was frustrated, angry, and wishing he could swear never again to buy another Microsoft product. “But, of course, like every other corporate user, I am stuck in a Microsoft universe for now.”

Bill asked the Gripe Line to intervene. Could I help him get back to work with no more outlay of his personal cash? “So far, I am out about $300 for an unusable product and I’m losing money by the minute in my inability to access necessary records.”

I tried.

I forwarded Bill’s letter to Microsoft a couple of weeks ago. And after a bit of back and forth and the involvement of several people at the software company and its PR firm, I finally got a response this morning:

“No comment.”

Ouch! That is harsh. Any of you have ideas for Bill?

Got gripes? Send them to christina_tynan-wood@infoworld.com.