SQL SERVER – Unable to Run Maintenance Plan. Error: Integration Services Evaluation Period has Expired

A few days ago, one of my clients contacted me to fix an error which they were getting while using maintenance plan – Integration Services evaluation period has expired. Here is the complete error message which was taken from job history.

Executed as user: NT Service\\SQLAgent$MSSQLSERVER. Microsoft (R) SQL Server Execute Package Utility Version 12.0.5000.0 for 64-bit Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Started: 1:00:00 AM Error: 2018-06-07 01:00:01.17 Code: 0xC0000033 Source: Backup Description: Integration Services evaluation period has expired. End Error Error: 2018-06-07 01:00:01.25 Code: 0xC0000033 Source: Backup Description: Integration Services evaluation period has expired. End Error Could not execute package because of error 0xC0000033. Started: 1:00:00 AM Finished: 1:00:01 AM Elapsed: 0.922 seconds. The command line parameters are invalid. The step failed.

In past, I have helped my clients in scenarios where they were not able to start SQL Service because the SQL Server installed using evaluation edition media which got expired. This is the first time, I saw that SQL Server was running and packages were not. I looked into the System Event Logs and I found following interesting messages from past 10 days.

Executed as user: NT Service\SQLAgent$MSSQLSERVER1. Microsoft (R) SQL Server Execute Package Utility  Version 12.0.5000.0 for 64-bit  Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.    Started:  1:00:01 AM  Warning: 2018-04-16 01:00:02.24     Code: 0x80000036     Source: Backup Description: There are 10 days left in the evaluation. When it expires, packages will not be able to be executed.  End Warning 

Which means, SQL packages were giving warning, and no one noticed it. Finally, SSIS got expired and unable to run any package.

WORKAROUND/SOLUTION

When they contacted me my first question to them was that if they have any backup taken recently? They informed me that since the package is failing, they have no backups.

As soon as I joined GoToMeeting, I first took databases backup using T-SQL command. It is interesting to note that their SQL was running because they didn’t restart after the expiry date. I warned them not to stop SQL Service till we fix the issue as we would have longer business downtime.

The steps are straightforward, which I have already explained in my earlier blog.

SQL SERVER – Evaluation Period Has Expired – How to Activate SQL Server?

SQL SERVER – Edition Upgrade from Evaluation to Enterprise Core – AlwaysOn Warning!

As soon as we upgraded the edition of SQL Server, SSIS also got upgraded and things were back to normal.

Reference: Pinal Dave (https://blog.sqlauthority.com)