Question : Problem: Expired Terminal Server Licenses Not Being Retuned to Available Inventory

We recently replaced an old server that had TS licensing installed.  When I installed TS Licensing on the new server, I deactivated TS Licensing on the old server but needed to keep the old server online because of the other roles it served.  That old server has now been removed from the network.  TS Licensing seems to be working up until a few weeks ago when I noticed that there were expired licenses not be returned to the available inventory.  If I understand the TS license process correctly, once a license reaches its expiration date, it should become available and I should disappear from the Issued to column.  Why are these licenses not becoming available?  More temp licenses are being issued.  I figure I have 90 days to figure this out before connections start being denied.

I saw a post stating that Volume Shadow Copy Service could interfere with this.  I checked the server and the Volume Shadow Copy service is not started.  I was thinking of stopping and restarting the Terminal Server License service on the License server.  Any other suggestions?

Answer : Problem: Expired Terminal Server Licenses Not Being Retuned to Available Inventory

Yes, that license now may take another couple days/weeks to get back to the pool.
Note the 89 day period may be anything between 59 and 89.
And in case you do have licenses expired and just waiting for them to be back to the pool, if a PC with a temporary license gets denied access to the TS you can simply delete the MSLicensing registry key on that PC that it will get a new temporary one. By the time this one expires your expired license will be certainly back to the pool.

Cláudio Rodrigues

Microsoft MVP
Windows Server - Terminal Services