Merge office365 and live accounts that use the same email address
I use both Azure/msdn and office 365
I already had an msdn account mvdl@our-company.com ( Windows Live account) and our company recently migrated to Office 365 which resulted in a mvdl@our-company.com Office365 account.
Wich is causing a lot of grieve when switching between asure web portal / msdn web portal / office 365 web portal
Even when I have no portals open, I cant switch accounts. I need to explicity open the portal that I last logged in to. Log out, and then I can switch accounts.
And having both office 365 portal and Azure portal open at the same time is impossible.
Marco
shared this idea
Our team owns the Microsoft account and Azure AD sign-in/sign-up experiences. We know that some experiences are confusing for some of you and we’re working hard to simplify them.
More specifically:
1) We know a number of users have multiple accounts with Microsoft, some they created themselves and others they got from their work or school. Today, using multiple accounts in Office 365, Azure.com or VisualStudio.com requires you sign out of one account and sign in to another. To address this we’re building the ability to be signed in with more than one account at the same time, in the same browser. This should start showing up on Microsoft web properties later this year.
2) There’s a small number of Microsoft business services that only support “Live ID” accounts, and not organizational accounts that are used for other business services like Office 365. Examples include MSDN and Volume Licensing. We’re working with these teams to add support for organizational accounts. This will allow everyone who already has an account they use with Office 365 to use the same account to sign in to these services.
3) Some users have two Microsoft-powered accounts with the same sign in string: one they got from their organization (when the organization uses Azure AD account) and one they created themselves (for example to access MSDN or VL). For these users, the sign-in experience to Office and Azure can be confusing. If you’re in this situation, the simplest solution is to rename the account you created yourself. You can use another consumer email address or get a new @outlook.com address. And later his year, you’ll also be able to use your phone number as a sign in string. Longer term, we’re considering different options to remove this overlap.
Keep the great feedback coming and please let us know if you finds other sources of account confusion. We’ll continue to monitor this thread as we refine our plans.
Ariel
184 comments
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Jason Brower
commented
I am glad I found this thread as I am still confused as to my issue but know it relates to the same. I just renewed my Visual Studio Online subscription, then created a development machine using Windows Enterprise. Just like other logins, I used my email to access the newly installed operating system. After running into permissions issues I somehow ended up on and realized that Azure AD was enabled and my account was associated with this Azure AD. When trying to look further into this a lightbulb from past experience went off where I have had many head scratching moments where I was logged into the azure portal but it didn't show the services for my home based business and that switching between work and personal account solved it. What I think I have done this time when installing Windows 10 Enterprise was that I must have used the "Personal Account" option last night as I thought this is what my MSDN was associated with.
I wouldn't mind being forced to switch between the two as much if I could simply identify what is associated with each version of my login. I started my company in 2009 and signed up for Office 365 or live or whatever it was called back then to host my email. I was part of the Bizspark program. I have had many MSDN subscriptions and now a Visual Studio subscription. I have had Azure cloud services for a few years. Out of all of this I have no idea what is associated with what. Have no idea half of the time what account I am actually logged in with (especially when it is cached). As both the company owner and personal account owner I just wish I could merge or get rid of the personal one and use whatever is associated with it on my other account.
If I remember correctly I think that this really causes headaches when I try to look at billing for Azure and the 365. I run into errors from doing billing reports during tax time. I really wish this could be fixed but I do thank Microsoft for putting up pages that acknowledge the difference between the accounts because before that, it felt like pure voodoo.
Cheers Team! (lol, now it is asking for my email to post this comment, wish me luck)
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Gerald Bruin
commented
I'm experiencing something similar, i.e. I have an .....@outlook.com account and tried to purchase an Office 365 business premium subscription, but the .....@outlook.com account is not recognised as an existing account when attempting to purchase. It's an utter disgrace that Microsoft just doesn't fix mistakes and bugs. It's high time this gets regulated by (inter) national legislation as it's become clear that some large IT corporations don't care at all about their clients/users. Unfortunately MS has a monopoly on office software.
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Daniel Simmons
commented
Today I created a new account in O365 for a new employee. I have an older employee's laptop and I used to have to create a new Microsoft account for the new employee which would lead to the dreaded situation of two accounts with the same email address.
However, now it seems I can no longer create a Microsoft account using the company email address created in O365 (first.last@ourcomapny.com). Apparently I need a laptop with Windows 10 Pro and need to have it linked to AD and then their O365 account can be used to log in. We're a small company and have no need/desire to do/pay for this. The alternative suggested was to create a new Hotmail account for the user to log into the PC with!
This whole thing has been a mess for so long, compounded in Australia by the fact that it is run through a local Telco who has never been able to really help me with any O365 issues. I also cannot migrate away from being tied to this AU situation.
The most frustrating thing was to try to go through the same process I have had to do for the past 5 years or so and today it doesn't work because apparently late in 2016 a change was made so that I can't use the email account in O365 to create a Microsoft account for the user to log into the company laptop with.
To be honest, I'm trying to look at migrating our functionality away from SharePoint so I can ditch O365 altogether.
ds
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Andrew Brooks
commented
What is even worse is when Microsoft stopped using Exchange ActiveSync for home accounts...I now can't use my primary (non- @outlook.com) email address to sign into Desktop Outlook (which I used to be able to do)! It has been like this for over six months now. Why don't you just make the personal Office365 the same as the business one, then we could use our own domains, etc. etc. ?
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Ollie
commented
*+1 to a resolution*
It gets worse when you have your @workaccount, your microsoft @personal, your purchased domain which was used for MSDN @myOwnDomain which you then have to create an organisational account 'within/with/associated' (nfi) @myOwnDomain.onmicrosoft.com which you then need to use for certain services that won't work with @myOwnDomain. But don't mistake it for @work, not to mention the @work.onmicrosoft.com account just for sharepoint (because someone stuffed something up)
I made the mistake of trying to add @myOwnDomain to @myOwnDomain.onmicrosoft.com obviously would end up with the same username, thinking this might 'solve' some issues but just created more (obvious now).
"you can doo it"
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Anonymous
commented
Time has passed and this continues to be unresolved. By when will Microsoft wake up on this one? I am tired of having to move between two accounts just to use different Microsoft services. Isn't making the life of your users simpler a priority for you?
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Anonymous
commented
this really needs to get fixed
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Teemu Leisti
commented
I recently ran into a problem with the installation of MS Office on my work Mac: when opening any Office product, a dialog would come up, saying "Account Notice -- We'ver run into a problem with your Office 365 subscription, and we need your help to fix it." When I clicked the "Manage Settings" button in the offered dialog, I was taken to a page that said "… you signed in with an account not associated with any Office products. … Already purchased Office? If you already have Office, please sign in with the same Microsoft account used to buy or activate Office. Sign in with your other Microsoft account".
That was when I'd logged in I with my @outlook.com address. I was unable to log in with my work e-mail address. Our IT support then told me that there are two different types of Microsoft addresses, and that I should reinstall Office using my work address for the error dialogs to go away.
Trying to understand the situation, I binged the problem (I jest -- I googled instead!), and ran into this page. I also found this article: http://www.brucebnews.com/2016/06/finding-your-way-through-microsofts-maze-of-work-and-personal-accounts/
It seems that Microsoft has utterly and completely stuffed up its management of user credentials, leading to a situation of continuing confusion and frustration for its customers. Well done.
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Ibrahim
commented
This is an extremely annoying issue. Add multi-factor authentication that my company has adopted and every time, I need to go through multiple steps to log in.
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Julien Chomarat
commented
As many others here, I'm really annoyed with this issue. Pro & Personnal accounts is a real pain. Could you please give us an update of the situation now.
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Brad
commented
The initial ADMIN response(s) to this from June 2015 implied that it was something KNOWN and that was ACTIVELY being worked. For it to have been KNOWN and ACTIVELY being worked would suggest that the work started before this thread. It has been 1.5 years since this thread started and yet the EXPERIENCE is still as confusing as ever. Trying to access Bing Places for Business or Bing Webmaster Tools jumps me around to multiple sign-in pages and 2 different passwords for the same username. BOTH ARE CALLED "BING". I literally just spent 2 hours working on my password manager to properly document which account (Bing, Office, Microsoft, Live, etc, etc) is tied to which password for my 1 username. This is ridiculous. As a Technology Director, I get complaints about confusion from my users about this mess all the time, so much so that they actively avoid logging in. We optd to go G Suites and avoid Outlook.com because of this mess and if I could get the users to drop their "need" for Office 365, we would leave and not look back. I can't imagine what is going on at Microsoft that this is such a horrible mess when Google, Amazon, Apple, you-name-it have figured out single username account credential.
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Shan Moosa
commented
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/11545/microsoft-account-rename-your-personal-account. This link doesn't resolve the issue for me. We cannot seem to rename our user account or email address. It keeps saying that the email is part of federated domain. Can someone from Azure team please assist.
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Dave Kolb
commented
It would also help with confusion to quit constantly renaming your website services because it gets confusing to know the latest microsoft, microsoftonline, Live, Outlook, Skype, Lync, Office, O365 etc.
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Dave Kolb
commented
Also if I logout of one MSFT website, keep me logged in to the others.
I should even be able to login to O365 using two different email addresses at the same time. I have multiple O365 accounts. Keep the logins both website and instance specific! -
Dave Kolb
commented
Confusing is a HUGE HUGE understatement. Not only confusing but also often broken and results in login loops.
Your logins are so messed up it’s hard to imagine they could be worse but could easily be fixed. I and everyone I know HATE the question about School, Work or Personal accounts which is stupid to ask for MANY reasons.
There is a simple way to fix your login system =>
1. Have each website remember where you store logins for its own website and check there (duh), and don’t ask the user if work, home, school. Get rid of that question totally! It makes no sense in many cases esp. when the user has multiple business and “work” accounts like I do.
2. Allow caching multiple logins for each website on the local computer, and if I have more than one email addresses for O365 or visualstudio.com, or whatever MSFT website, then show ALL the login ids, or email addresses cached for that website, and let me choose which one I want to use this time. Do NOT ask me if it is a school, work or personal account. Who cares and who remembers?Basically, allow a website to have multiple accounts based on an email, and ask me which email to use if I have more than one O365 account or MSDN account, and then remember the password for that email for that website.
It’s truly as simple as that, and what everyone else in the world pretty much does. I have multiple accounts at Amazon as well and it simply asks me which email address I want to use. If I use the same email address for O365 and MSDN you should NOT care. In fact you should prefer that! I may want to have a separate password for each even though the same email address. I do this all the time with websites where it has the same email but different passwords. The MSFT way is horrible. Do it this correct and more friendly way!
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Anonymous
commented
I got a lot of VMs on Azure using my personal account and O365 using my corporate account with the same email address. How could I merge or transfer all the VMs on Azure to my Corporate account with should be paid by company ?
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Anonymous
commented
Microsoft account , azure account , tfs account, office365 account
WTF!? how can we fix it -
Anonymous
commented
I renamed the personal account as suggested now I'm told that the account doesn't exist even though I am using the same username to login to my 365 office business account.
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Jim
commented
Found the right link that will likely work w/ the instructions I posted below: https://account.live.com/names/Manage
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Jim
commented
Same problem as everyone else here (work and personal account conflict). User experience is sucking it up pretty bad. Here is a set of instructions that is supposed to resolve this ...not working for me yet as navigation doesn't appear to be the same as described: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/11545/microsoft-account-rename-your-personal-account
