We all pay via higher credit card fees and interest. For such small amounts, the banks just write off the amount and don’t follow up with the merchant. Most likely the same person or group is operating many different merchant accounts at the same time.Ĭredit card chargebacks won’t cost the merchant anything. The seller can shut down their Ebay account and restart under another name. If people complain, they’ll probably ignore them. The Ebay merchant is hoping to sell as many of these ‘Office 365 licences’ as possible before being shut down. Microsoft could also pursue people who bought this stolen product, though that’s unlikely. Once detected, Microsoft can and probably will disable use of Office. It seems they are selling an organization or academic licence which is tied to a specific user/email address.Īnyway you look at it, what’s being sold is illegal and a breach of the terms under which the Office 365 licence was issued. Microsoft licences are either business or academic, not both. We’re not sure what they mean by a ‘business licence … part of an academic licence’. It says the license is ‘legitimate’ then explains how they a misusing an Office licence. There are workarounds for some of that, for example adding your own OneDrive account. That special account is shared with others, allowing them to see your Recent Documents list, OneDrive files and anything else saved by Office in a Microsoft Account. That’s not just for installation but also ongoing use of Office software. They’ll give you another email address and password to login. You won’t be able to use your own email to login to your Microsoft account. This is some of the details with our warning marks. Selling for less than US$4.Īside from the stupidly low price and the mix of ‘365’ and ‘2016’, the ‘fine print’ gives the game away. Microsoft Office 365 2016 Pro Lifetime Subscription 5 Devices 5TB WINDOWS MAC Instant delivery! NEW subscription 24/7 support.

Let’s dig into the details of one typical bogus Office 365 offer to see what they’re up to. There’s no such thing as a ‘lifetime’ Office 365 product key.

Office 365 Home or Personal can be extended for up to five years by buying multiple yearly plans and adding them to your account. They are priced just under the regular street price to seem like a good, legitimate offer.Īll Office 365 plans are time-limited, usually for a year. Some deals are obviously scams, like this one for just US$3 but others are more plausible. Lifetime Office 365 for under $3 … yeah right We’ve seen many cheap Office 365 Home, Personal, University and other plans sold as ‘lifetime’, ‘perpetual’ or ‘never-ending’.

Office 365 lifetime key