We have a full fledged website that has a checkout mechanism it,using which users can buy items,we decided to make an iOS app that will simply open the home page of the website under the UI web view of iOS.
I just wanted to ask is it acceptable by Apple as we are not using in app purchases?
No, your app will most likely be rejected.
From the App Store Review Guidelines:
2.12 Apps that are not very useful, unique, are simply web sites bundled as Apps, or do not provide any lasting entertainment value may
be rejected
If you are selling physical goods or services that are not consumed within the app you cannot use in-app purchase.
YES it is possible but I would strongly recommend you not to Use it.
This is apple Guideline for uploaded apps
11.2 Apps utilizing a system other than the In App Purchase API (IAP) to purchase content, functionality, or services in an app will be rejected
Related
How does apple decide whether an app is in-house? Is there a setting that I need to look into? Apple has rejected my application saying it is an in-house app and I cannot publish that app under Apple Developer Program.
They want me to have Apple Developer Enterprise Program to publish that app. I'll be thankful for any help.
EDIT: Here is the message from Apple
We found that your app is an in-house app, intended for employees or members of your organization. As such, it is not appropriate for the App Store.
For information on distributing proprietary, in-house apps, please refer to the iOS Developer Enterprise Program.
If you cannot - or choose not to - revise your app to be in compliance with the App Store Review Guidelines, you may wish to build an HTML5 web app instead. You can distribute web apps directly on your web site; the App Store does not accept or distribute web apps.
HTML5 is the major new version of HTML and enables audio and video to play natively in the browser without requiring proprietary plug-ins. Using HTML5, web apps can look and behave like native iPhone and iPad apps, and using HTML5's Offline Application Cache, a web app can work even when the device is offline. With web apps, you have flexibility to deliver as much or as little functionality as you desire.
To get started with iPhone or iPad web apps, please review the Safari Client-Side Storage and Offline Applications Programming Guide.
For a description of the HTML elements and attributes you can use in Safari on iPhone, check out Safari HTML Reference: Introduction.
I guess there can be many ways by which Apple can think of in-house apps and one of these can be your App Description. Here is the response from Apple that I received.
Hello,
Thank you for your response. The Application Description confirms that
the app will be used by employees of your company to stay connected
and informed of daily tasks and company information. If the app will
have an open registration and not limited to the internal use of your
company, please take the time to modify the Application Description by
providing this clarity and also accurately describe the app's features
and functionality available to all users.
Otherwise, the app is not appropriate for the App Store, and it would
be best to be distributed via the iOS Developer Enterprise Program.
As #Paulw11 said, Apple can even decide that your app is in-house if it doesn't allow everyone to use and limited to a group of people.
As far as i can understand, you are trying to publish your app from your Apple Developer Account which has "Developer Program of 99$" activated.
But to publish in house application, you would require an iOS Developer Enterprise Program which costs 299 $ yearly.
You have to enrol yourself to that and then publish the app via, your Enterprise program
Please respond accordingly if your intend was NOT to release your app as in-house application, will edit the answer accordingly
I have an app that I would like companies to buy licences for. Say they have 5 devices so would by 5 subscriptions?
is this possible with IAP?
Is there a way of stopping them just having a single shared iCloud account and buying a single licence which is re-used across devices?
Has anyone need to do this before?
Thanks
Unfortunately no, there is no way to do that on iOS. The app would be rejected, with or without In-App Purchase.
11.6 Content subscriptions using IAP must [...] be available to the user from all of their iOS devices
11.2 Apps utilizing a system other than the In-App Purchase API (IAP) to purchase content, functionality, or services in an App will be rejected
Ref:
https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#purchasing-currencies
Just so you know:
There are ways for large companies to buy app licences by volume (through VPP and MDM). But you would have no involvement in this matter, and you app still needs to be available on the AppStore.
I've read this guidelines:
https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#purchasing-currencies
And seems in point 11.3 "Apps using IAP to purchase physical goods or goods and services used outside of the App will be rejected", so, it applies with an app that sells tickets for entries in a music local?
11.2 Apps utilizing a system other than the In-App Purchase API (IAP) to purchase content, functionality, or services in an App will be rejected
11.3 Apps using IAP to purchase physical goods or goods and services used outside of the App will be rejected
From what I understand. You can use an alternative to IAP. With which you :
Can't sell content, functionality, or services for the app itself ;
Can sell physical goods or goods and services for outside the app.
Edit :
You might want to look this Q/A too : If I use the PayPal gateway in my iPhone app, will Apple approve it?
It looks like a duplicate of MPL library integration in iOS. Will it contradict APPLE in app purchase or any other payment rule?
Although if you get the ticket on the device itself, it could be considered a digital good.
Let's say I sell video-tutorials using a credit system and I want the service to be available as a website, an Android app and a iOS app.
So users may buy/consume credits and use credits to purchase video-tutorials from one of those 3 sources.
From Apple guidelines I read:
11.1 Apps that unlock or enable additional features or functionality with mechanisms other than the App Store will be rejected
11.2 Apps utilizing a system other than the In-App Purchase API (IAP) to purchase content, functionality, or services in an App will be
rejected
11.3 Apps using IAP to purchase physical goods or goods and services used outside of the App will be rejected
11.4 Apps that use IAP to purchase credits or other currencies must consume those credits within the App
11.5 Apps that use IAP to purchase credits or other currencies that expire will be rejected
Is it totally prohibited to use a credit system shared among many access points (as website, android, ios, windows and so on..) or it can be done just avoiding IAP (Apple in App purchase) and using for example PayPal mobile SDK?
It seems very strange to me that apps with this functionality cannot be published.
The only points in apple guidelines referring to credits (or virtual currencies are) 11.4 and 11.5 which make me think you can actually make an app that does not use IAP to purchase credits.
And if you can make an app that does not use IAP to purchase credits you don't have to respect point 11.4 so you can actually consume those credits outside the app itself.
BUT: given that you can sell credits without using IAP and so consume them even outside the app, using them to buy content will break points 11.1 and 11.2 ?
Thank you very much
I am not 100% sure about this, but based on other apps i have seen and the reason why other apps have been taken down i can think the following.
If your app uses the apple app purchase, then its fine.
If your app uses credits that came from another place, its also fine.
However, these credits SHOULD ONLY be purchasable using the in app purchase when the user access your service through the app. This means, you shouldn't offer any other "way of purchasing" credits while the user is using your app.
As an example i remember a very famous app, which i don't remember which was it, had to be taken down because it showed a link that would let users access the desktop purchase system, directly from the app.
There is also other examples. There are a ton of dating applications that use this system, if you go to their websites you can purchase credit, or you can directly purchase them within the app using the in app store method, the credits are the same for the service, just the way of buying them changes.
Another example is the game hearthstone, you can buy decks in game, but you can also buy them from their website, its not the same as credits, but the main point is the same.
Basically, what i think it means is, money related operations should go through apple if the service is being accessed by your app regardless of anything else.
You might want to wait for someone who has had more experience in this, I am just telling you what i have noticed.
Can we use in- App purchase in an iOS App distributed as a enterprise app? If not possible can we use paypal or any other purchasing mechanism for that?Does Apple create any problem here as they did for Kindle App using payment other than their one?
Since the Enterprise license doesn't cover App Store integration, your bundle ID isn't registered and approved with Apple, this alone means the StoreKit can't approve any transactions because it's not aware of your application.
Even if this wasn't true, the infrastructure behind StoreKit isn't in place for Enterprise apps.
In any case you could argue that in-app purchase in an Enterprise application doesn't really make sense since you would be providing this application to employees, not customers.
If you're not going to publish the application in the AppStore, you can use any purchasing mechanism that you want.
This link shows all the types of accounts and what capabilities each of them allows: https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/IDEs/Conceptual/AppDistributionGuide/SupportedCapabilities/SupportedCapabilities.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40012582-CH38-SW1
Apple Enterprise apps do not support In App Purchase, but they support a lot of other stuff