Branding, mission and their (un)consistency

Microsoft 's mission states: "Our mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more."

Last week I registered on partner central (their partner portal) and submitted the requested documentation. This requires providing evidence of the ownership of an internet domain. I "own" a domain since 2003 and it's maintained by IONOS since 2015. Each year at the end of august, I receive a renewal invoice for the period spanning from end of July current year to end of July next year.

Microsoft refused the document as it must be no older than 12 months and valid (because latest invoice I have from august 2023 is for a renewal lasting until July 2024). I added comments explaining the situation. Dismissed. I proposed to delete my account so I can recreate with another domain that is not in the invoicing limbo, definitely dismissed (I can make no more submissions).

I opened a support ticket (which I had to cheat on because if I stated that I exhausted all my submission reiterations, the tool wouldn't allow me to open it) just to receive the exact same feedback that I got from the automated process:

Dear (Alessandro), 

Thank you for providing additional documents to our team for account verification. Upon review, we identified that the documents you’ve shared are too old to be considered for account verification. 

All documents submitted should be issued within the previous 12 months or where the expiration date is a future date that is at least 2 months away. 
[We will follow up in [x] business days if we have not received a response.] 

Thank you and best regards,           

Now, let me be clear: this happened with Microsoft but could have happened with any other company because that's how things work and that's a standard that just exist even though anyone knows when, how and why. Even though I can guess the when: when we moved from phone support to online support. Why? Because keeping an employee stuck at the phone fixing your problem is expensive: it is cheaper to fix the customer's problem ASAP. But online? Incoming emails and empty replies have near-0 cost: that's profitable.

And I have a very similar problem as I forgot to swap my phone number in a Microsoft Sandbox I forgot about which is now inaccessible as I can't receive the SMS OTP. Unable to get support.

To all my professional network : when making business decisions, think about your customers; if you put them through this, make it consistent with your mission. Or make your mission consistent with your behavior else your brand may suffer. Furthermore: is this the future you want to create or will you stand up ?

PS: Ionos too has an issue: as they invoice 1 month after renewal, this generates a limbo in time in which you own a domain but are unable to prove it.

Looking forward to your feedback !