Cannot Login / Invalid EMail or Password problem - fixed?
Over the last few days I have posted some increasingly frustrated, annoyed, and angry posts about the problems I had been having logging in to my game, to this website, to Origin, to anything Sims related and the lack of help I was getting from EA Support :evil:
So, it is only right, that I report that I believe the problem, for me, has been fixed :D
To be honest I still think there was a fault on EAs systems over the week-end and the fact that they never seem to let their users know when they have problems caused me to attempt fixes that made my particular problem more frustrating.
So, at the beginning, on Saturday I went to play my game and despite putting in the same Email address and password that I have always used, it rejected them as 'invalid'. Several attempts later, typing very carefully, still no joy.
Concerned that my details might have been hacked I clicked 'Forgotten Password' so that I could change it. But the Email I got back contained a link that went to a dead page! I eventually found another login page, on ea.com I think, which did give me a link to working password reset page.
Curiously that page wanted a password that contained a mix of letters and numbers, whereas my old password was all letters. Had they changed their password rules without telling us, were they now rejecting 'insecure' passwords - without warning?
Anyway, changed my password ... no difference. Of course, not being able to login I couldn't even open a support case! :-(
I decided to try creating a whole new account with a different Email address and a more 'secure' password. It worked perfectly! Of course, I couldn't access my "real" account, my Simpoints balance, my downloads etc., but, at least, I could now login and raise a support ticket :-)
And EAs response "Login using the Email address used to register your game". Like Duh! I would ... if I could! :-(
Anyway, long story, short(ish) I fixed it today. I think the problem was that I had set my Firefox browser to keep a session on thesims3.com website open all the time. Now this session was originally opened using my original password. So I think, without any confirmation from EA, that it must have been checking my credentials on that browser session with the new password I had entered, discovered they were different and locked my account.
I closed that old session, logged out, logged back in with yet another new password, and it all seems to be working fine now (fingers crossed!)
Conclusions?
1. EA really should sort out their user account update pages - do they need a mixed password or not?
2. EA should create a 'System Status' page on thesims3.com site so that if there are system-wide problems, such as server overload or network outages, we can see that they are aware of the problems we are experiencing and reassure us that they are working to fix them. Keeping quiet about problems only makes your users frustrated and angry.
3. If you change your password, log out of any existing browser sessions that you started with your old password.
Sorry for the excessive wordage, but wanted to acknowledge fixing of the fault and, perhaps, offer some useful information to EA and other users with a similar problem.
So, it is only right, that I report that I believe the problem, for me, has been fixed :D
To be honest I still think there was a fault on EAs systems over the week-end and the fact that they never seem to let their users know when they have problems caused me to attempt fixes that made my particular problem more frustrating.
So, at the beginning, on Saturday I went to play my game and despite putting in the same Email address and password that I have always used, it rejected them as 'invalid'. Several attempts later, typing very carefully, still no joy.
Concerned that my details might have been hacked I clicked 'Forgotten Password' so that I could change it. But the Email I got back contained a link that went to a dead page! I eventually found another login page, on ea.com I think, which did give me a link to working password reset page.
Curiously that page wanted a password that contained a mix of letters and numbers, whereas my old password was all letters. Had they changed their password rules without telling us, were they now rejecting 'insecure' passwords - without warning?
Anyway, changed my password ... no difference. Of course, not being able to login I couldn't even open a support case! :-(
I decided to try creating a whole new account with a different Email address and a more 'secure' password. It worked perfectly! Of course, I couldn't access my "real" account, my Simpoints balance, my downloads etc., but, at least, I could now login and raise a support ticket :-)
And EAs response "Login using the Email address used to register your game". Like Duh! I would ... if I could! :-(
Anyway, long story, short(ish) I fixed it today. I think the problem was that I had set my Firefox browser to keep a session on thesims3.com website open all the time. Now this session was originally opened using my original password. So I think, without any confirmation from EA, that it must have been checking my credentials on that browser session with the new password I had entered, discovered they were different and locked my account.
I closed that old session, logged out, logged back in with yet another new password, and it all seems to be working fine now (fingers crossed!)
Conclusions?
1. EA really should sort out their user account update pages - do they need a mixed password or not?
2. EA should create a 'System Status' page on thesims3.com site so that if there are system-wide problems, such as server overload or network outages, we can see that they are aware of the problems we are experiencing and reassure us that they are working to fix them. Keeping quiet about problems only makes your users frustrated and angry.
3. If you change your password, log out of any existing browser sessions that you started with your old password.
Sorry for the excessive wordage, but wanted to acknowledge fixing of the fault and, perhaps, offer some useful information to EA and other users with a similar problem.
