Microsoft Office Professional Academic 2010

[dtlee]

Honestly, I do not know of any walk-in retail stores who continue to sell the Academic version of Microsoft Office.

MEI Microcenter has this product in their retail stores only (not via online purchase). Here is the requirement from their website:

Microsoft Office 2010
Academic Edition

In order to qualify for these purchases, you will need to verify you are either a Student, Teacher or Faculty Member. The following are acceptable forms of proof for Microsoft Academic Editions - Limit 1 per customer per title.

Teachers, Faculty and Staff Members, please provide one of the following:

1. A copy of a current picture School I.D. card; OR
2. A copy of a recent paycheck stub (all sensitive information may be blacked out) or some other official school document verifying your employment with the school , PLUS an alternative picture I.D. card (driver’s license, etc. - all sensitive information may be blacked out).

Students of Higher Education, please provide one of the following:

1. A copy of a current picture School I.D. card; OR
2. A copy of a current enrollment form showing tuition as paid for current semester, plus an alternative picture I.D. card (driver’s license, etc. - all sensitive information may be blacked out).

Students of K-12 Institutions, please provide one of the following:

1. A copy of a current picture School I.D. card; OR
2. A copy of a current report card, enrollment form, or some other official school document showing your name as a current student, PLUS a picture I.D. card for the student (state id card, driver’s license, etc.) or, for minors, a picture ID card of one the student’s parents having the same last name of the student.

K-12 Homeschools, please provide one or more of the following:

1. A copy of a letter from the local county or state’s department of education or school board recognizing your homeschool; OR
2. Copies of receipts for purchases of homeschool curriculum packages in addition to verification of membership in any homeschool associations

I called the local store to ask if I needed to bring anything in to buy this product for my daughter who attends school 125 miles away. I pretended it was a Christmas gift and I did not want her to know I am buying it. They told me that if I cannot surreptitiously somehow get at least a copy of her ID, they cannot sell it to me.

[taxea]

What practice forum?

What are you talking about?

Sorry Koss....different site I was thinking of...mmmmmm (Yoda impression)

[dtlee]

Don't confuse the Home and Student version with the Professional Academic version. They have different licensing conditions. The former may be purchased by anyone (for "non-commercial" purposes, an unenforceable provision for most practical purposes), the latter, in theory, may only be purchased by qualified customers.

Like NewEgg, Best Buy no longer sells the academic versions, though they do sell the "Home and Student" and "Home and Business" editions. If I am not mistaken, the only remaining academic version of Microsoft Office is the "professional" one we are discussing which includes Access and Publisher. The ethical vendors who I spoke to claim they will verify eligibility, but I am sure there are others who won't. I can vouch for one of them, since I bought copies for each of my kids from them when they went to college.

Honestly, I do not know of any walk-in retail stores who continue to sell the Academic version of Microsoft Office.

[Gary2]

Don't confuse the Home and Student version with the Professional Academic version. They have different licensing conditions. The former may be purchased by anyone (for "non-commercial" purposes, an unenforceable provision for most practical purposes), the latter, in theory, may only be purchased by qualified customers.

[erchess]

More Ethical Dealers

Are there any of the national chain stores among the more ethical dealers? If so I'd like you to name it or them, possibly in a PM should you so desire and if not I'd like to know how to find one and how much if at all their prices for the products anyone may buy exceed those of the less ethical?

In my earlier post I was making an assumption that I now question, to wit that no one can be put by a valid rule of ethics at a competitive disadvantage compared to others offering similar products or services. To put it another way anyone may do anything without ethical worries if unlikely to actually be punished for doing so because one's competitors will be doing the same thing. Yet I don't follow that rule in my dealings with the taxing agencies or with software vendors who offer free versions for non commercial use. So there's no obvious reason why I should treat Microsoft that way. I want to thank you for giving me food for thought. It's a moot point since I no longer use Microsoft Products other than Windows that comes already installed but this was still a useful exercise for me.

[dtlee]

I bought the students and teachers versions of Office 2003 and 2007 at times when those were the most current versions. I bought 2003 from Best Buy and 2007 from Office Depot. I was not asked to show any credentials for either sale and I have been told by clerks in Staples that they follow the same policy of letting anyone buy the Students and Teachers editions. I did have occasion with the 2003 software to uninstall and reinstall enough times that I had to call Microsoft to get the key reset not once but several times. The last time was on a new computer. The reason for all the re-installations was that my family bought a defective computer that was eventually replaced by the seller. I was never quizzed about my status or where I bought the product.

As far as ethics go, I don't consider that it is unethical to buy a genuine Microsoft product on any terms that may be offered by a seller who is publicly offering those terms and is as far as I can see able to be found by Microsoft and hauled into court if it does anything wrong. As far as the seller's ethics, they are not behaving unethically unless they do something contrary to the actually enforced terms of their contract with Microsoft.

Thank you for your well-thought-out response.

Microsoft has their license rules available for all to see here:

http://www.microsoft.com/student/en/us/office/terms.aspx

They also have rules for OEM licenses which are violated nearly every day (often with Microsoft's assistance).

Like I said, I am not preaching. This is what I have been told by Microsoft and the more ethical dealers who follow their rules.

As an aside, I agree that Microsoft is unlikely to stop a revenue stream from purchases of their product if they are making money, and I am sure they are making money even on the academic versions.

[erchess]

Credentials

I bought the students and teachers versions of Office 2003 and 2007 at times when those were the most current versions. I bought 2003 from Best Buy and 2007 from Office Depot. I was not asked to show any credentials for either sale and I have been told by clerks in Staples that they follow the same policy of letting anyone buy the Students and Teachers editions. I did have occasion with the 2003 software to uninstall and reinstall enough times that I had to call Microsoft to get the key reset not once but several times. The last time was on a new computer. The reason for all the re-installations was that my family bought a defective computer that was eventually replaced by the seller. I was never quizzed about my status or where I bought the product.

As far as ethics go, I don't consider that it is unethical to buy a genuine Microsoft product on any terms that may be offered by a seller who is publicly offering those terms and is as far as I can see able to be found by Microsoft and hauled into court if it does anything wrong. As far as the seller's ethics, they are not behaving unethically unless they do something contrary to the actually enforced terms of their contract with Microsoft.

[Koss]

Practice Forum?

What practice forum?

What are you talking about?

[taxea]

AZ since you post so many questions may I suggest that you post the non-tax prep related (equipment etc) questions on the practice forum rather than the tax forum? Mahalo

[dtlee]

The 2010 versions of Microsoft's software can read and write files created in earlier formats, but use the new format begun in Office 2007 for Excel, Powerpoint, and Word by default when creating new files or saving them with new features. This is not true of Microsoft Project which generally cannot save files in earlier formats, but also is generally not included in any office suite. Also, many of the feature in the office suite are not backwards compatible especially with regard to the embedding feature in Powerpoint 2010 and the enhancements to the conditional formatting in Excel 2010. When creating earlier files for use in earlier versions, these features may not work or may not work as expected. I have not seen problems bringing earlier formats into the 2007 or 2010 products.

Regarding the question of "auto transfer" or "manually," it is difficult to answer a question like this. There is nothing, for example to convert every file from a .ppt to a .pptx or a .pptm file or every .xls to a .xlsx or a .xlsm. If you wanted to create those newer formats this must be done "manually." However, opening an older format file requires you to do nothing special, so you could possibly consider that to be "automatic" but then I have no idea what the "manual" equivalent might be (perhaps cutting and pasting???). Once you open a file (it "automatically" opens old file types), it will generally save the files in the same format it opened it in but will warn you if you changed it to use new features which are unavailable in the older format. Thus, if you are asking if it will "automatically" save old files in the new format, the answer is "No." You need to specify the new file type specifically for any of your old files if you want them saved in the new format.

I generally use the Corel Office Suite for anything I do not potentially have to share with others because they still have upgrade policies and have not hidden every feature I use all over a ribbon (and in the even more critical "options" menu item).

[AZ-Tax]

Nope, could not locate an msoffice 2010 upgrade

If I recall correctly, upgrade pricing has been abolished for Microsoft Office 2010.

I did a search. Could not locate a MS Office 2010 upgrade. There is a MS Office 2007 upgrade but no 2010. So I am curious, does the files created in an earlier version of MS Office still auto transfer to MS Office 2010 or will the files need to moved manually?

[Gary2]

is that Microsoft does not really care who buys the academic versions but the license does say you should be a student or teacher. I also understand that the biggest difference between Academic and other versions is that if and when you want to upgrade to a newer version the Academic cannot be upgraded while another version can be upgraded for significantly less than the normal price of the new software.

If I recall correctly, upgrade pricing has been abolished for Microsoft Office 2010.

[dtlee]

is that Microsoft does not really care who buys the academic versions but the license does say you should be a student or teacher. I also understand that the biggest difference between Academic and other versions is that if and when you want to upgrade to a newer version the Academic cannot be upgraded while another version can be upgraded for significantly less than the normal price of the new software.

Not sure I agree with these comments.

First of all, the most ethical dealers require copies of credentials for people buying the academic versions as required by Microsoft (yes, I know that these are easily faked and yes, I know that there are unscrupulous dealers who will sell anything to anyone). Secondly, Microsoft has stopped upgrade pricing for all products even though they had allowed students to upgrade to full licenses in the past.

I am not trying to preach and I am definitely not a Microsoft fan, but I do use their products.

[erchess]

My Impression

is that Microsoft does not really care who buys the academic versions but the license does say you should be a student or teacher. I also understand that the biggest difference between Academic and other versions is that if and when you want to upgrade to a newer version the Academic cannot be upgraded while another version can be upgraded for significantly less than the normal price of the new software.

[dtlee]

Generally, the answer is yes, although there are sometimes fewer restrictions on the number of installs allowed for student and faculty users.

In general, such products are not available for non-academic use except when the student has graduated from school after holding a valid license as a student. I am not sure if Microsoft follows that rule.