Commercial use - Connection time out

fredlanger

OK - so I am not alone. I use Team Viewer once or twice a month to help my 96 year old mother in law with her computer.  That's it.  What in the world would have triggered a "commercial activity" alert?  Is it simply their attempt to get people to pay for a commercial license regardless of true usage?  Does anyone have another recommended solution for free remote control access for such minor usage?

d1rage5

I would say using a vpn to connect or connections if you are connected to a domain.

Clevenger23

I am being flagged saying commercial use detected and I am limited to 5 minutes. This is strictly personal use. To my personal computers. I would like this flagged removed and my full usage restored

pretzell

Guess it is a way to force you to a licensed version

Lilfuzzage

Looks like instead of filling out their useless form its time to report them for truth in advertising violations to the FTC and  have them fix this companies obvious bait and switch scheme. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/media-resources/truth-advertising

Shahesam84

Hello,

I have false coomercial use popup which is bothering me to use teamviewer in my computers. I have tried to submit a ticket and apparently that option is not available for me. What should I do?

I need help please.

Thanks,

Sam

CoolRaoul

I really can't understand why TV team doesn't just simply publish an comprehensive list of what does triggers commercial use detection.

Even when a free user is incorrectly flagged as commercial, if, by chance, after having filled the form (and maybe made an hand written act of contrition if requested ? ), his/hers account gets unlocked, the conditions which have activated the detection will eventually happens again, sooner a later. 

And since free users are unable to know what conditions have produced those false positives in their typical usage case, they are totally unable to know what to change in the way they use the product to satisfy those *unpublished* conditions.
It's practically Kafkaesque.

Teamviewer team: being transparent on what *you* consider as commercial use should completely solve this issue. What can be your problem with that?

bazbsg

@CoolRaoul TV probably thinks that if they publish the triggers for the commercial use algorithm that commercial users will be able to use that to get around detection.

Realnoize

@Lilfuzzage 

I'm not sure such an action would work. Maybe. But I'm not sure. The TV team surely has access to a legal team that greenlit an initiative such as this. They could legally argue that they in fact do allow free personnal use. They will say that those not having access to free personnal use anymore are those who broke the agreement of using it for personnal use, so legally speaking, I think this holds.

The problem is not falsely advertising free software. The problem is falsely accusing people of commercial use of their product and locking them out of something they should have access to. And this is something that will be impossible for us to debate, as we can't "prove" we're using it in a manner in accordance with their licence, because no one knows what they define as "commercial use" in their detection algorithm. 

What is needed is a class action in court, but this, over what is "supposed" to be a free for personnal use product would be prohibitively costly and would not get anywhere. This would be unproductive. So....

The thing to do, I guess, is to move to a competitor, and never recommend TV in any way to anyone, including businesses who may be tempted to get a commercial licence. No one wants to give business to a company that fail to honor what they advertise, even if it's free software. If we accept that they can do this, then we accept that they can also not give what they advertise to paying customers. Given how they treat their "personnal use" customers, I wouldn't personnaly give them any business.

I still find that completely insane that a company like this is shooting itself in the foot like this by willingly pushing away free (unpaid) ambassadors for their products. I work with IT people all the time, and I'll be sure that no one ever consider a TV product. By creating frustration in people on a personnal level, those same people will carry these frustration where they work. I can't believe the TV team never thought about this. 

I mean, a company who'd want to sabotage their reputation wouldn't process in any different way.

bikemaker

It is getting unacceptable. I would at least like an acknowledgment or status, when I submit a request. 

bikemaker

I would look for another product. The TV Support team isn't helpful 

Finnyfo

yes, look in my previous no machine reply.

pretzell

I think there is more behind the WHY this is happening, and I doubt TV will ever disclose the real reason... It would be nice if an TV admin would step in and reassure the community.
The reality is, that the free users are slowly migrating to alternatives and TV don’t seems to be bothered by that, since the revenue is the real driver here (not the free version).
Unfortunately, the same thing will happen to the alternative solution. Once the number of users reach a certain volume and a smart cookie in management says Hey! why all these free users, lets force pay and make $$$.

Good luck to you all

qclanton

Hello!

I use teamvier from time to time (~1 time in a month) to help friends or parents with computer. Today teamviewer said that I user it for commercial purpose and demands pay for license.
If I try to connect to somebody, Teamviewer block connection after 10 seconds.
Why did this happen? Is there a way to remove this kind of ban?

Florentina319

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@Natascha wrote:

Hi there, 

Thank you for your posts. 

Can you please read the following article and fill in the form to request the unblock of your ID. 
Why do I see 'Commercial use suspected' / 'Commercial use detected'/mykfcexperience

Please be aware that the unblock is valid for the TeamViewer ID you submitted via the form and not for your TeamViewer Account. Please submit a separate form per each TeamViewer ID.

Thank you in advance and have a great weekend. 

All the best,
Natascha

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Love it thank for the valuable information…

TonyaG

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@Finnyfo wrote:

No machine seems to escape any commercial use check. I've given up submitting forms to Teamviewer and gone with the alternative.

---

That's probably what they want - (for us to give up). This is their way of getting rid of FREE TV users without actually coming right out and telling us so. A different product that I was using a few years ago that starts with the letter L did just that. They didn't beat around the bush about it like TV is by making you think that they think you're using it comercially etc. They apparently want us to give up. They are obviously trying to annoy us to death until we pay or move on to another product.

JDTV

I am having the exact same problem and submitting the IDs of the computers I am remoting into, for which I have received responses from TeamViewer that they were reset to "free", DOES NOT solve the problem when logging into them from my work computer using the Team Viewer Chrome plugin. If there is no solution for this use case then I will need to find another product to use to remote into my families computers to help them with windows updates, antivirus, troubleshooting etc. I can not use the TeamViewer client on my work machine as it is blocked by the administrator, so my only option is to use the Chrome plugin when my family needs computer help when I am at work. VERY frustrating and it has been going on for WEEKS with no end in sight. I have filled out the form to get my free access reset multiple times and have emailed TV directly and have received NO RESPONSE.

 Sigh...

 

dabeckman

I have the same problem.  It started this week.  I uninstalled and reinstalled.  Even tried an older version.  I also created a new user.  Still times me out

sjohnson144

I am a private retired individual who uses TeamViewer free version to help my alert, intelligent, and not particularly tech savvy 94-year old mother with her computer issues. I cannot do that with the 5 minute (more like 1 minute) time out I just started getting. What is the use of 1 minute? What is the use of 5 minutes? It has taken me HOURS to solve a problem that I have to see to fix, and sometimes interact with her on the phone at the same time. 

I have loved TeamViewer for allowing me to support my Mom. I am not happy about the change that made this tool unuseable. HELP.

danteafk

Did anyone get a response back after filling out the form? How long does it take? I send it like 3 months ago and still nothing.

mencik

Nope. It's all a scam to get us to pay for a license, just like a competing product did a number of years ago.

ahmiowa

I'm sadly giving up on TeamViewer.  I just got off the phone with tech support, and they changed their algorhythm for identiying "commercial use".  And it now includes accessing from a non-residential location - i.e., so I can't even use my laptop from work to access my home computers?  Or my elderly mothers?

I'm not unwilling to pay a fair price. But when the options are:

1) Free, but with restrictions that make it unusable, or

2) $500/year

That's nuts - [removed per Community Guidelines]

When will TV just say that free is GONE, and offer a reasonable price for private, non tax-deductible use?

 

ikelly

I just downloaded TeamViewer 14 for two different computers, one which is a laptop. And the other being a desktop. When I test to check the connectivity I get an error message stating: The trial license of your connection partner has expired. As your connection partner uses TeamViewer commercially, either one of you (one of the connections partners) needs a valid TeamViewer license". I never purchased a license for TeamViewer, I am using this non-commercially. It is simply to check either one of the computers remotely, if I were to forget something on my desktop and need it to display on my laptop I can't in this situation. PLEASE GET THIS FIXED!!!! 

Xinterp

I've submitted a request to get this removed. Still have not had this reversed. I hate to look into another RD application, but it seems like that's my only option at this point when I'm modifying something with my home network or dedicated server for 7 Days to Die/Ark.

I'll give it another week. If it's not reverted by then, I'll look for greener pastures. I don't want to think about it that way, but I'll have no choice.

Steve-in-FL

It's been many pages since I wrote this response, so I'll update it and do it again for some newcomers. If you learn something, great. If you already know all this, well, I tried.

@JDTV
<<...submitting the IDs of the computers I am remoting into, for which I have received responses from TeamViewer that they were reset to "free", DOES NOT solve the problem when logging into them from my work computer>>
According to TeamViewer, using the product from a work environment is considered commercial. Same as logging on from a school environment or any environment in which any person receives compensation. You may not be making money on the usage, but it violates their new rules. So they may have unblocked you, then, when you used it from work, re-blocked you. See below for other info that may help you.

@danteafk
<<Did anyone get a response back after filling out the form?>> Sometimes, but much more often "no." See below for other info that may help you.

Here is one positive experience:

I filled in the online form for each of my 13 IDs. They unblocked 12 of those IDs within a few days. The 13th was still blocked. I filled in the online form again with no results. Then I received an email asking me to fill in the "declaration of private use" form. I did so and listed the 13th ID (even though the form doesn't ask for the ID at all). That 13th ID was unblocked within 24 hours.

Note that you have to submit the first form for each ID you have. Each TeamViewer transaction has two sides, each of which has an associated ID. So you have to submit a separate form for each ID. I submitted an online form for each ID I have and on the form listed all of the other IDs, so everything could be cross-referenced, if necessary. I showed the name assigned to each of the IDs. For each ID that "looked" commercial, for example DATASERVER, I explained that it was used only in my home and for a specific, non-commercial purpose. When they asked for the "declaration of private use" form, I also listed the ID and the name assigned. That's it.

All I can say is that it worked for me. Other people have not been so lucky, with no action of any kind in response to their forms. Can't say why.

I consider the unblocking a response, so I was not unhappy that they didn't write me an email when they did that. It's not good public relations, but my concern was unblocking - I consider that the important part of the response. In fact, the only email I did receive, was the one that said I needed to fill in the Declaration of Private Use. The response I got for that one was, again, unblocking, but no email.

This page has general information about this situation:

https://community.teamviewer.com/t5/Knowledge-Base/Why-do-I-see-Commercial-use-suspected-Commercial-use-detected/ta-p/5265

Their official explanation for what is private vs what is commercial is:

https://community.teamviewer.com/t5/Knowledge-Base/How-exactly-is-quot-personal-use-quot-defined/ta-p/4712

Some people have called this a scam, but I think it's a very inept attempt to get "commercial" users to pay or drop out. But I know that the system is unclear, appears to be arbitrary and is inconsistent. They are **bleep**ing off a lot of people, when a simple explanation would probably have been sufficient. If they can't afford to give away free services, well, we all would have grumbled but accepted it.

There may be a secondary reason related to their attempt to take the company public (German IPO), pointed out by another forum user. They want the financial numbers to look good. For each ID that TeamViewer has registered, TV tracks when that ID is logged on. When the ID is logged on, it updates the dashboards of all other users that list that ID. That process could be utilizing a lot of TV internal resources, and this effort is an attempt to lower the number of users who do not pay, by either shifting them to paid licenses or dropping out all together. Unless someone knows someone inside TV, we'll never know.

Good luck.

musicreporter

Save yourself some time and start looking now

If you have not read all the messages here, you will eventually learn the frustration and aimless point of waiting.

Xinterp

Thanks for the heads up.

I'll be looking for something new. Too bad that they don't care about the people who have been using them for quite some time and have suggested them to their places of employment which now use commecial licenses.

**bleep** shame.

Xinterp

The server in question, which could be the only thing I could think of, isn't a version of Ubuntu, Windows Server, or any other such thing. Not even a client running a VM. It's a W8 machine running a Dedicated Server that hosts P2P Client Access via open ports.

This is not labeled as a "Server" under their ToS as it's not something that I'm remoting into. I'm using this to change the Dedicated Server (Video Game) config files from a remote computer on my network.

Either way, if this is what flagged me, this makes no sense, as all other machines on my network are okay, and the machine in question is a W10 device.

I appreciate you trying to clarify the issue, but your clarification doesn't apply in this situation as this situation doesn't need clarification.

The device has been wrongfully flagged. 
It is a W10 machine.
I have filled out the form and have given the company over 2 weeks to resolve the issue.
It is still not resolved.

Seeing the amount of dissatisfied people experiencing the same exact problem, I'm going to take another user's advice and move on to another RD Application.

Doesn't matter if it's free or not to be honest. As long as the prices aren't extortionate, I'll pay the price.

If TeamViewer had personal licenses for $50/yr, I'd gladly pay that.
No way am I going to pay $500/yr when I'm not using the application commercially.

Jholc

Since I moved into a new house I've found that my teamviewer is telling me that I'm on a coprorate network and that I need to upgrade my license. Can anyeone help me out with this? I use Teamviewer to help my family members when they have issues. 

D0TheMath

Having the same issue. I think the issue first started when I connected my phone to my works wifi network. 

Will be contacting support un less anyone else has any suggestions.