Acrobat Pro 2020 Student-Teacher Edition serial # mis-registration

[FelixCambridge]

I recently purchased the standalone Acrobat Pro 2020 Student Teacher Edition (macOS) and, despite multiple (successful) installs/deinstalls using my education-verified Acrobat serial #, the application repeatedly fails to launch with Adobe Licensing Application giving a "Error code: TRIAL_NAG_WF" error.

I now believe it has something to do with the fact that I verified my eligibility using my .edu email address, received the Acrobat 2020 serial #, then inadvertently created an Adobe Account using my personal gmail address, and registered the serial # under this Account. After multiple installs/failures, I realized my mistake and created a new Adobe Account using the .edu address.  However, registering the serial # here indicates it's "already in use". Logging back into my gmail.com Adobe Account, of course, doesn't nothing.

So now, I'm stuck with a locked out Serial # and it doesn't seem I can even contact Adobe Support because I don't "have a registered product".  Any suggestions?  Thanks in advance.

[try67]

Try contacting them by phone or chat and explaining the situation to the agent you talk to:

Chat support: https://helpx.adobe.com/contact.html?rghtup=autoOpen
(type "Agent" to chat with a real person)
Phone support: https://helpx.adobe.com/contact/phone.html

[FelixCambridge]

Thanks for pointing out their phone help line - was surprised I connected with live tech support so quickly despite not having "a registered product". More importantly, I got my issue solved! Solution consisted of 2 big parts:

1. The rep reassigned the serial # to the correct Adobe Account (in this case, they were fine with the gmail.com account; .edu wasn't required). However, even then, Acrobat Pro 2020 would immediately quit after launching. This is despite multiple uninstalls / installs, edits to my /etc/hosts file, running AcroCleanerMac, etc. - all under remote control by the rep (anyone else uneasy with total remote control where you explicitly allow multiple Privacy escalations?  Hope no key logging going on.)

2. The bigger remedy was manually deleting licensing cache files in /Library/Application Support/Adobe (forgotten which subfiles specifically). This was in addition to those in your home directory ie., ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe. Basically, I had a ton of these leftover from prior installs of Acrobat 2017, Acrobat DC, etc. and none were removed by any of the Uninstallers or AcroCleanerMac. My guess is that the Adobe Licensing app kept defaulting to these instead of fetching fresh online. Once I got rid of these, reinstalled Acrobat 2020 fresh, and restarted for safe measure, a cold launch of Acrobat triggered a mandatory login to my Adobe Account which had never appeared before.

Seems like overly complicated license controls leading to these hard-to-diagnose scenarios. But it is what it is. Thanks again.

PS - beware: almost got phished by AdobeHelpCare@outlook.com reaching out to provide support.

[try67]

Well spotted! Some people here were less lucky recently: https://community.adobe.com/t5/acrobat-discussions/support-fraud/m-p/13222165