ORA-12514 TNS:listener does not currently know of service requested in connect descriptor

this issue and the fix was to make sure in tnsnames.ora the SERVICE_NAME is a valid service name in your database. To find out valid service names, you can use the following query in oracle:

select value from v$parameter where name='service_names'

Once I updated tnsnames.ora to:

TEST = (DESCRIPTION = (ADDRESS_LIST = (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = *<validhost>*)(PORT = *<validport>*)) ) (CONNECT_DATA = (SERVER = DEDICATED) (SERVICE_NAME = *<servicenamefromDB>*) ) )