Azure Management Dashboard: Cannot add Monitoring Rules for Virtual Machines or Cloud Services

Every attempt I have made across the past month to add Monitoring Rules to Virtual Machines or Cloud Services within our Azure subscription results in an error, and the error itself is not providing any useful information (it seems to be pointing to a non-existent microsoft schema:

<string xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/2003/10/Serialization/">{"Code":"BadRequest","Message":""}</string>

Steps to Recreate:

1. Login to Azure Management Portal (Standard - not the Preview portal)
2. Choose Virtual Machines
3. Choose a Virtual Machine from the list
4. Choose the 'Monitor' option
5. Choose 'Add Rule' from the bottom ribbon
6. Complete first screen of rule information (Name, Description - Alpha characters only)
7. Click Next Arrow
8. Complete Next Screen ('Greater than', 70, 'Average over the last five minutes')
9. Choose either of the Actions for email options, complete relevant information
10. Tick 'Enable Rule' (ticked by default)
11. Tick Check Box to complete and submit

System provides a notification in the bottom ribbon that it

Could not create rule 'RuleName'.

Clicking 'Details i' Provides an error message that in itself seems to be an error attempting to access a microsoft library element:

<string xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/2003/10/Serialization/">{"Code":"BadRequest","Message":""}</string>

The url referenced leads to the following error message:

The resource you are looking for has been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable.

I am looking for a solution that will allow me to complete the creation of the rule - the badly formed error message / updated schema would only be helpful if it led to a better understanding of the error.

The same result is obtained when attempting to create an email alert / rule through the Management Services module in the portal.

I cross posted this to the MSDN network. Another individual chimed in indicating they were having the same issue - and a Microsoft Moderator asked me to check again, as it was working for him.

Portal definitely updated, and now both the Management Services module, and monitoring from the VM module are successfully creating rules.