Office 365 cloud features do not work when using a privacy VPN

I'm glad my reply was helpful to you. I subscribed to the premium version to avoid ads and claimed faster performance. I also use it on my android phone. I'm glad I'm not spending any more time trying fixes, configuring , and testing. That said  I'm very grateful to all the posters who offered suggestions and help to this community.

Afte trying the fixes and experiencing off and on frustration, I switched to hotspot shield. This seems to be working quite well. I haven't had the office problems or onedrive problems that I had previously with nord. It cost me a new subscription, but it's paying for itself by saving troubleshooting time. 

Yes, Hotspot Shield worked for me, too!!!

(And I should point out that I have tried a number of possible fixes in vain while I was using NordVPN. Again, I'm running Office 365 Business under Windows 7. The problem was severe lags with Outlook -- so severe it could take five minutes to load the profile and even longer to open a New or Reply email message -- and sometimes it would just open the profile and remain in "Trying to connect" for as much as ten minutes, and then sometimes go from that to "Disconnected" and never connect.)

Now, Outlook in Office 365 works like a top, just like it does when I have no VPN connected!

Apparently, the reason Hotspot Shield is able to overcome this issue, while so many other VPN services still exhibit it, is that Hotspot Shield uses entirely proprietary (and advanced) technology unique to them, while essentially all others use the few technologies that are widely in use.

(I don't think the issue I was having was unique to NordVPN. I think most other VPN services would have still had the same issue I was having.)

All my reading up on Hotspot Shield indicates it's just great for normal business people. (It may be worth paying for the Premium, to avoid ads.)

I appreciate the help.

To clarify:

• I've done separate installs on three machines now and the identical problems exist, all Windows 7 machines and all using NordVPN
• for basic use the symptoms are: A) long lag times when launching Outlook and having it load the profile, B) long lag times when I go to Reply to an email or create a New email
• the basic use of Word and Excel have been entirely fine
• NordVPN tech support (high-level, from what I can tell) ended up telling me it's not fixable to their knowledge

I cannot say whether the forum posts (more than 100 I've seen so far) on this subject conclusively lead to the problem being far more prevalent with Office 365 but that sure seems to be to be the case.

I'm planning to try Hotspot Shield. (I've been reading up on it since the other post about it, and it seems like it might offer hope since they use proprietary/unique methodologies. Too bad there are suggestions they might play games with going a bit far with their marketing relationships.)

I agree that, of course, if Hotspot Shield solves the problem that would be infinitely more practical than the stand-alone version of Office on multiple machines. And it's a lot easier and cheaper (free, actually) to test out. And I'm hoping a few others here will test it out and report back.

G'day JayTech55,

I run Office 365 (Home) now, though did have Office 2013 previously.  Both 365 and the "standalone version" are the same.  It's just a download and install of the latest version of Office, not an online version.  It's just the licensing that's different

• an annual subscription instead of an outright purchase - so I doubt the standalone version will make a difference.  Maybe a complete uninstall of Office and reinstall might help??

The default gateway definitely worked for me.  I'm on Windows 10 but would have thought it would work on Win 7 as well.  Your issue sounds a bit different to the norm.  Even before I applied the fix, emails would come in as they should, even though Outlook thought I was offline.  It just wouldn't download pictures/graphics in the emails. I also couldn't open files from OneDrive in Word or Excel.

As another poster mentioned here (just after your post), the issue doesn't occur with all VPNs.  The other poster changed to Hotspot Shield and said it was working for them.  That would seem an easier and cheaper option.

cheers

Paul

Afte trying the fixes and experiencing off and on frustration, I switched to hotspot shield. This seems to be working quite well. I haven't had the office problems or onedrive problems that I had previously with nord. It cost me a new subscription, but it's paying for itself by saving troubleshooting time.