Renewing your Windows or Office licence


If you have a University-owned Windows laptop which has not been connected to the campus network for more than 150 days you will need to renew the Windows and Office licences.

Overview:

Normally, University laptops renew their Windows and Office licenses automatically when they are connected to the wired network on campus. As many people having been working from home due to COVID, and not connected to the campus network, you may need to renew the licences manually.

How often do I need to renew the licences?

If you have connected to the campus network or connected to the VPN for a two hour consecutive period, the licences should automatically renew and you don't need to do anything.

If you are unsure how to use the VPN, see the related unsure how to use the VPN, see the related 'Unsure how to use the VPN' article here. If you experience an issue joining your computer to the VPN, please log a support request with the IT Service Desk here.

Microsoft Windows and Office licences need renewing every 180 days.

You will start to receive pop-up warning messages about your Windows licence 150 days after it was last renewed. The pop up will say "Your Windows license will expire soon”. When the 180 days is reached the message will change to “This copy of Microsoft Windows is not activated”.

For Microsoft Office, you will begin to see alerts in the applications of “This copy of Microsoft Office is not activated” after 150 days. It will give an indication of how long you have to reactivate. For example, “You have 29 days left to activate”. After 180 days the applications will continue to alert “This copy of Microsoft Office is not activated” and they will have reduced functionality.

Re-Licensing your computer

If you are working off campus or are unable to connect to the campus wired network, connecting the computer to the VPN for two hours will allow the computer to re-license itself without  needing to do anything else. See the related documents for information about configuring the VPN here.

You can also force your computer to re-license with the following instructions.

Update Microsoft Windows licence

Connect to the VPN (see related article here). Please note: If you are unable to connect to the VPN service it may be necessary to try again later.

Click Start, type Run, click on the Run app

In the dialogue box enter the command:

slmgr.vbs /ato

The following dialogue will be shown to indicate it has completed:

slmgr auto dialogue confirmation

To verify you have a further 180 days license period you can check the time due before expiry.

Click Start, type Run, click on the Run app

In the dialogue box enter the command:

slmgr.vbs /dlv

The following dialogue will be shown:

Activation confirmation dialogue

The Volume activation expiration shows 180 days remaining.

Update Microsoft Office licence

Connect to the VPN (see related article)

Click Start, type cmd and click the “Command Prompt” app.

What you need to enter will depend upon the version of Microsoft Office you have installed:

In the Command Prompt Window, type (or copy and paste)

For Microsoft Office 2013:

cd \Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office15

Or for Microsoft Office 2016:

cd \Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office16

Then press "Enter"

The in the Command Prompt Window, type (or copy and paste)

cscript ospp.vbs /act

The output of the command will show whether the activation has been successful:

Command Prompt running the license update

Important: Once you have successfully re-licensed please remember to disconnect from the VPN.

Other options

For those users and / or computers that are connected to the ADMIN domain and unable to use the VPN to re-license your device, please contact the IT Service Desk by logging a request here.

If your University device cannot be connected to the campus network, or it cannot be connected via VPN we may be able to apply a persistent license code. This is only done in exceptional circumstances in such examples as isolated systems or those being used overseas without internet access.

Please log a request with the IT Service Desk here if this is something you wish to discuss.

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