Serious trouble ordering from the MS store

I live in the UAE. To get the Blade over here, I'm trying to use Aramex Shop-and-Ship, which involves sending the machine to a building in Queens, NY. So far, I've tried to make payments with PayPal and an American credit card; in both cases I've received error 30225 and been told to call MS support. There may be something wrong with the credit card (the friend who it belongs to hasn't used it in a while), but PayPal should be working. When paying by PayPal, I have the billing address down as the shop-and-ship address, which I've been told should work fine. I still receive error 30225 every time I try to place the order.

I have tried calling support along with the friend whose card I'm using; we seemed to be getting somewhere last night but her credit ran out after two hours. We will try again today.

MS support could be suspicious because: the billing and shipping addresses are different and in different names; the order is being made from outside of the US; and my friend is currently in Kenya on a work-related trip, so the support call is being made from Kenya.

So I'd like to ask: have you received error 30225 while ordering the Blade from Microsoft? If so, how did you deal with it? Is there anything in particular we should be asking support to look for? Ideally, I'd like to just call them, verify whatever information they like, have them remove any blocks on my account and place the order.

I've been trying to make this thing work, between using PayPal and my friend's card, for about a week and am at my wits' end. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you all.

 

I remember having a similar problem a while back although I don't remember the exact error code I was getting. what I ended up doing was creating a new account and checking out that way. It worked for me with no problems when I used the new account.

 

Thanks a lot; I'll give it a shot once we've made sure my friend's card is working correctly. Tried making a new account and ordering with PayPal through a VPN with an American IP, and that didn't work. At least we know PayPal is one of the problems now.

 

I had the same error when I was trying to order a Lumia 1520 from them in December. I spent a week trying to sort it out, tried multiple credit cards, triple verified all my information, and even called support and had them attempt to place the order and never solved it. I gave up and drove the two hours to the nearest Microsoft store and bought one there.

Fast forward to this month, my account had gone untouched since then, and suddenly I have zero issue ordering the Razer Blade. It's pretty obvious its some kind of issue with the store and not the payment methods. I would second the suggestion to make a new account (I did, but in my case, it did not help either.)

 

Unbelievable stroke of luck--I ran into my friend's sister today, and she was nice enough to offer her card when I mentioned spending three hours with her sister on Skype last night. Going to make another new account and use a new card, so hopefully MS won't find anything suspicious this time around.

EDIT: same error message. Talked to support for an hour and apparently it's a problem with the bank--perhaps transactions with the MS Store need pre-approval. I'll be in the states in a couple of months but doubt the Blade is worth the wait, considering I'll probably be selling and getting next year's model once it's out. Guess we'll see what happens

 

Let me ask you this , what browser are you using to place your order ?

Have you tried using a different one ?

 

So far I've tried Safari, Chrome, Chrome mobile and Firefox mobile. Some time last night after the third card failed I realised I was spending close to $3000 (with MS Complete), even with the student discount. For that kind of money I could just pick up a Bolt II from Digital Storm with a 780Ti in it. Might just repair my brother's banged-up m11x for indie games and buy the Bolt once I'm in college.

Long story short: maybe the Blade will be worth the hassle once it's packing Broadwell and 20nm Maxwell and is literally a no-compromise machine. Until then the whole MS kerfuffle is too much to deal with.

 

So the Blade would be worth the money if MS wasn't flaky? That makes no sense.

 

There's no such thing as a no-compromises notebook. Why stop at Broadwell/Maxwell, when you can wait for Skylake/Pascal in 2016 or Cannonlake/Volta after that? There is always something new on the horizon, but if you don't stop and smell the flowers, it's just a really long walk.

 

I neglected to mention something: I'm heading to the US for college in August, so my choice was between picking up a Blade now and taking it with me or getting a desktop while over there. Since MS is being a pain, I can't get the Blade before college since I'm travelling in the summer, so I'm leaning heavily towards the desktop.

hfm, you're absolutely right; what earlier about the MS issue making the price unjustified makes no sense. I posted while aggravated and it shows. However, after thinking things over carefully, I've decided I'm not in a position to drop $3000 on a laptop. Seems like an incredible machine, but not the right one for me right now. Thank you all for your help.