Account Claiming Issues


*Note: If you have an problem Claiming your account and can't resolve it after reviewing the common issues below (Things YOU Can Check), please contact your local PSU technology support for assistance.

Common Issues Encountered When Claiming Your Account

Some users have encountered the following issues when trying to claim their account. You may see an error when trying to claim your account, or the "Next" button at the bottom of a screen may stay "grayed out" preventing you from moving to the next screen and completing the process. We've captured common issues here to help you either identify the problem or eliminate some common account claiming challenges.

Things YOU Can Check:

  1. Birthdate entered in wrong format (should be: YYYYMMDD with no slashes or dashes - e.g. 19820217)
  2. Entering the "wrong number" for UID# - The eScholar UID number is the 10-digit State Employee UID which is frequently the same as the teacher/staff number in PowerSchool. Employee UID numbers should be in the Staff UID system as well as Payroll, so your Finance Person may be able to help you locate it. This number is your Username for the IAM Service. For students, the UID number is the Student or Pupil Number in PowerSchool. If you're not sure of your UID number and all other information seems correct, then your local help desk person can check the UID number and a few other items (see next section).
  3. Can't set Password - this can be caused by not filling in the verify password box or not matching the original password entered. Also, some special characters may not work or cannot be entered as the first character of a password (e.g. "!" - exclamation mark). Review the password policy and make sure you're entering at least 8 characters, one upper case letter, one lower case letter, and one number.
  4. Can't set Challenge Questions - there is a three-character minimum for an answer, so make sure all questions you're answering are at least that long. Additional requirements on acceptable answers are listed on the Challenge Question form.

Things Your PSU's Technical Support Can Check:

  1. Account is not present in your PSU data - If your LEA Administrator or Help Desk support enters your UID or searches on your last name and your account doesn't show up, they (the LEA Administrator) should escalate the issue as described  under the "Support" menu item. This may happen if you've recently transferred from another PSU and your Staff UID record hasn't been updated yet, or if you're a "Contract Employee" and your Staff UID record hasn't been created (i.e. Employee records in the Staff UID system are created from Payroll entries. Contract employees are likely not entered into this system and will need a record created directly in the Staff UID System as a Non-PSU Employee).
  2. Account has Already Been Claimed - This can happen if you tried to claim your account previously and quit the process before completely answering the Challenge Questions. There are a few other scenarios where this flag can be incorrectly set that are more obscure. This can be checked by your local support (LEA Administrator) in the IAM Service. If your Profile shows "Disable Account Claiming: True", then the claim flag needs to be reset. LEA Administrators can do this by doing a search for your record in Manage LEA Employees, selecting it (clicking the checkbox at the left), and clicking on the "Details" button to the right of your record in the list view. After clicking the red "Edit Profile" button at the bottom of your detail screen, the Disable Account Claiming checkbox should be unchecked and the record Saved. Your Challenge Responses should also be Reset (one of the buttons along the bottom of the List Display window).
  3. Birthdate is wrong in the Staff UID System (Source Data where birthdate in the IAM Service comes from) - this can be checked by having your local support staff verify your birthdate in the IAM Service. If it's incorrect, the Staff UID Administrator for your PSU will need to correct it in the Payroll System and force an update to the UID System. The corrected birthdate should show up the following day in the IAM Service. You can also claim your account with the wrong birthdate and have it corrected afterward (this won't impact your account in the IAM Service in any way).