FIX: You receive a "Your personal site cannot be created because a site already exists with your username" error message when you click My Site in SharePoint Portal Server 2003

In Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server 2003, when you log on to the portal and then click My Site, you may experience one or both of the following symptoms:

• You receive the following error message:
  Your personal site cannot be created because a site already exists with your username. Contact your site administrator for more information.
• The Create My Site page appears, but nothing happens.

As a result, you cannot connect to or create your personal site.

This problem may occur if the name of the user account that you are currently logged on to the portal as contains one or more of the following characters:

• \
• .
• @
• "
• #
• %
• &
• *
• :
• <
• >
• ?
• {
• }
• |

For example, you may experience the symptoms that are described in the "Symptoms" section of this article if the name of your user account is "#User1" (without the quotation marks).

This problem was first fixed in a hotfix that is now contained in a service pack. If you installed the latest SharePoint Portal Server 2003 service pack, you do not have to install the hotfix.

Service pack information

This problem is corrected in Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server 2003 Service Pack 1.

To resolve this problem, obtain the latest service pack for Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server 2003. For additional information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Hotfix information

A supported hotfix is available from Microsoft. However, this hotfix is intended to correct only the problem that is described in this article. Apply this hotfix only to systems that are experiencing this specific problem. This hotfix might receive additional testing. Therefore, if you are not severely affected by this problem, we recommend that you wait for the next software update that contains this hotfix.

If the hotfix is available for download, there is a "Hotfix download available" section at the top of this Knowledge Base article. If this section does not appear, contact Microsoft Customer Service and Support to obtain the hotfix.

Note If additional issues occur or if any troubleshooting is required, you might have to create a separate service request. The usual support costs will apply to additional support questions and issues that do not qualify for this specific hotfix. For a complete list of Microsoft Customer Service and Support telephone numbers or to create a separate service request, visit the following Microsoft Web site: Note The "Hotfix download available" form displays the languages for which the hotfix is available. If you do not see your language, it is because a hotfix is not available for that language.
The English version of this hotfix has the file attributes (or later) that are listed in the following table. The dates and times for these files are listed in coordinated universal time (UTC). When you view the file information, it is converted to local time. To find the difference between UTC and local time, use the Time Zone tab in the Date and Time tool in Control Panel. Note This update requires Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server 2003.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section of this article.
This problem was first corrected in SharePoint Portal Server 2003 Service Pack 1.

For more information about My Sites, see the "Managing Personal Sites" topic in the "Administration" section of the Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server 2003 Administration Guide. The Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server 2003 Administration Guide (Administrator's Help.chm) is located in the Docs folder in the root directory of the SharePoint Portal Server 2003 CD.

For more information about SharePoint Portal Server 2003, visit the following Microsoft Web site: