"We're having trouble connecting."

[FauxCorgi 0]

I keep getting this error trying to log in... This wouldn't be a big enough issue for me to make a forum post, though, I did not genuinely need to log in to release my land and cancel my premium account. I'm in a financial bind and can't afford to pay for this service right now (or even play SL right now) and need to cancel it until things are good again. I can't seem to do this from the dashboard and have to log into the game, but...then this error shows up.

My internet is working properly and I disabled firewalls. Still no change, still can't cancel my payments. Is this a known issue that I will just need to ride out for a few hours/days or is there something I can do about it? I can't afford to do my usual monthly game payments this month, so I'm sort of frantic about it, I guess x_x

[Rolig Loon 15,737]

Actually, you do need to be able to log in to abandon or sell your land on the Mainland, before you'll be allowed to downgrade from a Premium account. If you only own land in private estates, you won't need to give it up for that reason, but you will still need to get rid of it in order to avoid paying land fees.  If you haven't already tried, I suggest contacting Live Chat.  You can still do that as  Premium member, and you don't need to be in world. It's possible that your problem is related to the difficulty that Linden Lab has had with servers since Tuesday. If so, Live Chat should help you sort it out. If not, then the problem is on your end. All I can suggest are the normal solutions (reboot your router and modem, get off of wifi, check with your ISP ... ), which typically clear things up for most people.

[FauxCorgi 0]

Update: I've tried resetting the router (hard to get away with, I live in a building shared with many others and the router isn't supposed to be tampered with, oopsie...) but it didn't do anything. I guess I'll have to try live chat. ;n; Thank you for your responses, I hope I can get this sorted out so I don't have to worry about paying money I don't have for something I can't use right now

Edited September 8, 2017 by FauxCorgi

[FauxCorgi 0]

Day 2. So far I have...

• Disabled my firewall
• Uninstalled all of my virus protection (for nothing, mind you)
• Uninstalled and reinstalled the entire game
• Installed Firestorm and tried using that
• Tried to log into god knows how many different known working regions
• Reset our entire internet setup as instructed
• Used live chat who did nothing but tell me to reset everything for the umpteenth time (which didn't work anyway)
• Tried using a public DNS
• Tried using an alternative IP address
• Made an alt account to see if it's account-related (it wasn't)
• Restarted the entire computer between most of these things
• Most likely gained about a dozen new gray hairs.

And  here I am, still unable to cancel my premium account because evidently it is too much to ask me my security question and release my land remotely so I can stop paying for something I CANNOT use. I'm beyond frustrated and I'm out of ideas. My head hurts. I'm tired of not being able to do something that should have been accessible via the dashboard from the start. I can't avoid another charge unless I release my land, which cannot be done without accessing the game (something I CANNOT do, as I've explained already) or want to deal with changing my payment method to be invalid so I can rack up a huge bill on the account and get myself banned.

Edited September 9, 2017 by FauxCorgi

[Rolig Loon 15,737]

So, have you called the billing office?

US/Canada: 800-294-1067

[Lindal Kidd 6,358]

You seem to have tried everything that you can do on your end.  It's highly unlikely that LL has anything that would help on their end.  That leaves whoever is in the middle...hello, FauxCorgi's ISP, will you please stand up?

Contact your ISP and tell them that you're having problems connecting to Second Life.  Explain the troubleshooting you've already done and ask them to look into any possible problems on their end of things.

[Nalates Urriah 1,338]

You have tried all the right things. But, you haven't told us about any of your connection metrics. This type of problem is almost always a connection problem. Having a good Internet connection that works for email and surfing does not mean you have a good connection the the SL servers or have all the ports open that SL requires.

Use the information here to see where the problem in your connection is: http://blog.nalates.net/2011/10/26/troubleshoot-your-sl-connection/

Since you are using a shared connection, they may have a port blocked that you need. If you are connecting via wire, you may be able to look at the router setup and control screens and open any port you need. An alternative if you are on a laptop is to go to a coffee shop or church and jump on their wifi. On weekdays churches are often a good choice. On worship days they tend to have a huge data load as parishioners open their smartphone Bibles. So, on weekdays 8-5 there is usually huge pipe sitting unused.

[Lillith Hapmouche 1,014]

Aside from the connecting problem which someone else with more insight hopefully may pick up... besides the suggestion to try and login to some other region, if you haven't done that yet ... you can manage your premium membership on your dashboard on https://secondlife.com/my/account/membership.php?lang=en-US - "Manage Membership" and checking the basic option at the bottom of the page. 

Be aware, though: if you are on any "prepay" option - the quarterly or the annual plan - you won't be refunded your already paid amount, but you will remain premium for that remaining prepaid time. 

Also: if you have deeded any tier to any group, you must withdraw that donation from the group, aka set your donation to 0 and save, then manually tier down on the Landfees page, https://secondlife.com/my/account/landfees.php?lang=en-US .
The manual tier down is also required if you have paid for more tier for yourself, otherwise you will still be charged.

[LittleMe Jewell 8,731]

Live Chat:  Ask if a Linden can go to your land and return your items and abandon it -- be sure to explain that you've been trying to log in to do it yourself but that you cannot and explain that you really, really need the premium fee to not happen.  That would get you to a point where you can then downgrade via the dashboard.