Individual vs Team for business use

[inquirendo95]

We have around 6 Adobe CC individual licenses as of now, each one is a used by an individual user and not shared. As of recently we started receiving calls and emails from a department in Adobe called "Adobe Global Business Direct" informing us that we are violating the license by using this for business use. I can't find anything specific in the TOS that states this isn't allowed, I did find the following forum posts that seem to confirm this is compliant. 

https://forums.adobe.com/message/9118756#9118756

https://forums.adobe.com/message/8267138#8267138

https://forums.adobe.com/thread/1271552

https://forums.adobe.com/message/8239123#8239123

Has anyone else been experiencing this? It seems kind of like they are just trying to push people towards the team licensing due to the increased cost.

[John T Smith · Accepted solution]

You as an individual may use your subscription on any computer you wish

Cloud License allows 2 activations at a time http://www.adobe.com/legal/licenses-terms.html

-http://www.adobe.com/content/dam/Adobe/en/legal/servicetou/Software_Terms-en_US-20150601_2200.pdf

-Install on a 2nd computer http://forums.adobe.com/thread/1452292?tstart=0

-https://helpx.adobe.com/creative-cloud/help/sign-in-out-activate-apps.html

-Windows or Mac does not matter... 2 on the same operating system, or 1 on each

-Two activations on one account MAY NOT be in use at the same time (note in the above license link)

-An individual account is for one person and may not be shared with anyone else

[John Waller]

inquirendo95  wrote

As of recently we started receiving calls and emails from a department in Adobe called "Adobe Global Business Direct"

Never heard of them. Have you asked for evidence of who they claim to be? Have you checked if their emails show signs of phishing?

Phishing | Scamwatch

They could be legit (I'm checking) but Adobe has been the subject of many similar sounding scams lately.

[inquirendo95]

It does sound like a scam especially with their sales tactic of license violation, team license required for business. I did the basic sniff test with the email headers, reply to address, and their contact number and they all check out as a legit or maybe subcontracted division of Adobe.

[John Waller]

OK, I'll see what Adobe staffers elsewhere in these forums have to say about the issue.

They are aware of this discussion.

[MadisonLeupp]

Hi,

I've just sent you a private message with steps to forward the email to me. I'll look into this ASAP for you.

Thanks!

-Madison

[SJRiegel]

I was also contacted by someone from this division (back in December) - We have 13 individual licenses (one for each designer), and the caller was pushing hard for us to convert over to a team license, with a very strong implication that we should not be using individual licenses for business. (I gathered that we were contacted because all of the licenses are being paid on the same credit card).

[J__Matthew_Brown]

I was being relentlessly hounded and decided to contact Adobe through the main number . The representative had me send the most recent email to her and made note on each of the four accounts we have that they were going to stay as individual accounts. She promised that I would not be contacted regarding switching to the business license again. We will see.

[joshb23580417]

Yes, I can not get rid of them. On top of that I called the Corporate Office and the receptionist team hung up on me because I didn't have the name of the person I would like to stop the calls and emails.  This is harassment.

Sonakshi Mahajan Territory Account Manager Adobe Business Direct Adobe Systems Incorporated

Toll Free: 866-646-1776 x 37504 Email ID: somahaja@adobe.com

[ProDesignTools]

As others have said, you can definitely get/use an Individual license in a company – or on the flip side, you can buy a Teams license (even just one) as an individual. There is no limitation on purchase.

Just keep in mind the differences between the two options when making your decision as to which works out better for your needs...

Just one example: you cannot transfer or reassign an Individual license. In general, you have a lot more features and flexibility with Teams licenses for management, deployment, tracking, reporting, control, billing, support, etc.

[demitrip40966593]

I had someone from Adobe email me (and followed up with a call) stating that the individual licenses could not be used for commercial purposes. I asked this person to please send me where in the TOS it states this, and have yet to receive an answer.

The person who called me does appear to work for Adobe (the original email was so poorly written and formatted that I assumed it was a phishing scam.)

Can I get confirmation from someone official at Adobe that I am not violating the license terms?

[ProDesignTools]

You can definitely use Individual licenses for commercial purposes. That should not be an issue by itself.

Just keep in mind that Individual CC subscriptions are single-user licenses and Adobe IDs cannot be shared.

By contrast, CC for Teams licenses can be flexibly allocated and reassigned as needed.

[Tuttleharry]

Another year has passed. And for the third year in a row I am getting harrassed by Adobe. Once again a new rep is saying that my individual account is not valid for business use. Once again, I will be forced to waste valuble hours going back and forth with Adobe to prove that nothing in the TOS prevents me from using an individual account at my company. This is unbelievable. 

[Scott Griswold]

I assume you are posting this due to the most recent round of emails. I just got flooded with an email on each individual account that we have that forwards to a single management account. They are claiming that we can't use emails on our business domain as Adobe ID emails. And that we need to change them by Dec 4th or they will contact us to switch to Teams. Can anyone point me to where in their TOS it says we can't use a business email address to manage indivudal subscriptions? We are a small business with 5 or 6 users and have NO use for the services provided by teams. We will just be paying more money for services we don't use. Affinity Photo is looking better and better every year. 

[xavierv19885516]

Just happened to me also. Not over email or phone, but within the "live chat", once I was asking to buy a second license to use in my company (for a second person) and he was enforcing me to go to a Business/TEams plan and stated that if Adobe can Prove that I was using Individual account on a Corporate Environment I could get blocked and even loose all the rest of the period payd for in my Yearly plan. When he (Igor, from Adobe Brasil) got asked for Legal Terms to suport it, he passed me the "main link", I wated a good 5 minutes and found nothing specific. I asked him to let me know the Articule exactly and he was off with "Can I assist you with anything else?". This is really low for any professional to behave this way and specially to Adobe to allow this type of behaviour! This is shamefull!

Glad that I work with Video and There are a lot more NLEs that are becoming 1st choices trought the Video Industry! 

[Scott Griswold]

I ran into the same thing yesterday on the live chat. They tried to steer me toward teams by saying that managing individual accounts was easier. I explained that I was fine with it and that I just wanted to know I was working within the EULA. I asked that they point me to where in the EULA it says I can't use company email addresses for individual accounts. If they can't I would like to continue using the individual emails without being bothered by more upsell emails. 

This was the reply...

"No worries. Well this is just a recommendation, it is up to you which subscription you want to use. If you wish to stay in Individual please, ignore the up sale emails you receive."

So with that transcript in hand I'm just going to delete any further emails I get pushing us to use teams.