Microsoft Office Not Appearing After Changing Username

Hey there,

So, very new to Mac computers. It's a Macbook Air and it's running OSX Yosemite 10.10.3. I bought it 2nd hand from a friend, so changed the computers login to my own name and password. Now Micrsoft Office no longer appears.

Any ideas would be great! I assume Office is still on the computer somewhere. It was a full working version and it was activated already.

Thanks in advance.

teethytaylor

Welcome to the forum.

You don't own Office unless the original owner of the system transferred the license to you with Microsoft by deactivating it from their account and allowing you to activate it for your account. I don't know how you "changed the computers login" to your own name, but if you created a new user, you can only see that new user's files when you are logged in as that user. That's part of the security of the system. If you just changed the name, unless you followed Apple's requirements on how to do that, you lost access to the files from the previous owner. Again, it's the system security that is baked into OS X. Also, Office will "phone home" to see if you are the licensed user and when it sees your username, not the original owner's, it will balk. Also, the system may be still registered at Apple under the original owners AppleID unless they went through the proper process to de-register it, so when you go looking for upgrades and updates you'll be stuck again because you will need that original AppleID and password. Sorry for all that bad news, but there you are.

At this point, I'd do a new install of OS X under your own AppleID and if the hardware can handle it, move up to 10.11.5 El Capitan, then sign up for the $7/month license for Office. You get all upgrades and updates free when they come out and full support from MS as long as you pay the $7 each month.

As Jake states, unless the original owner removed it from any other computers and provided the CD and activation code it ain't yours but still his. Changing User ID negates all previously registered software and you have to do anoher install. I suggest not inquiring from Microsoft as they consider what your friend has done, if supplied without CD and code, as piracy!

Thanks to both of you for your responses. That sucks that we don't have Office anymore, but I understand why now. Thanks for the info on the $7 per month Office package. I didn't know that existed!

It's called Office365.

Or you might like to try one of the free office suites such as Libre.