The installation of this package failed (Office 2007 compatibility pack)

So you receive an attachment from a friend or colleague and can't open it, you're suggested to go to the Microsoft website and download a file. So good so far, you download the file to your machine, run the installer but then get "The installation of this package failed"

I spent a while trying to figure out the problem here, some posts suggesting cleaning Temp files other registry, until I noticed that the Installer is only a bare minimal package with very limited Error codes built in. So first and always rule of thumb with a failed installer specifically if cleaning Temp directories doesnt work...

Check your administrator rights, this will then solve the problem. If you don't have local access to the PC you cannot install the patch.

Hope this helps others in the same situation. If not stop being tight and upgrade to Office 2007 :)