We are using Amazon FPS payment gateway for purchasing goods through IOS app, now we need to upload it to apple review team and as this is production app, it is pointed to production/live Amazon FPS account so here I want to understand if apple really want to buy anything then they need some credentials by which they can test the purchases.
So first thing really apple tests the whole purchase flow? If yes then what credentials should I provide? or should I update the server for sandbox mode till apple approves the app?
You should submit your app and select "Hold for developer release".
Then you can provide Apple with credentials on your sandbox server to test with.
When Apple approved your app, you can switch your server to production, then release your app.
But, I have a feeling they are not going to approve your app because it provides a mechanism for folks to buy things that does not give Apple a cut of the action. This is not unlike the issue with magazines and newspapers (or anyone) selling subscriptions via non-Apple Store mechanisms: Apple doesn't like when they get cut out.
Apple would prefer you use In-App Purchase, so they get a cut.
Good luck!
EDIT:
Indeed, there is a distinction to be made for real versus virtual goods, which I guess I missed when I read your post. Sorry.
To your actual question: Will Apple test it? No one knows. :-) You should assume they will, and provide some test credentials for them to use.
I can tell you from experience with a (free) commercial app I built, before we launched the service, we had the app submitted, and Apple did register on our backend and test out the app.
We released a charitable "micro-giving" app on iOS that uses Amazon payments to externally process the donations. We submitted the app with our production payment system.
According to our server logs, during their review Apple never submitted a payment or even initiated one.
It took a couple of submissions to get approved, but their feedback largely was focused on making sure we were complying with Apple's guidelines (donations must be processed external to the app, i.e. via safari), and making it clear to the user what the exact donation process was.
I think it's unlikely that Apple would spend money to test your app, nor would they wait to see if you actually delivered the goods as promised either. However, I do think that they will make it clear to you in their feedback if they want to test without spending real money.
Related
I'm implementing IAP for SaaS application. I nearly finished with Store Kit's integration, receipt validation and other development related stuff. But I still have 2 more questions regarding Apple's guidelines which I couldn't find answer to on the docs.
The first question: I read on few places on the web that my app should provide minimum functionality even if the user is not subscribed. I offer a SaaS app and I don't want the user to be able to use the app if he's not subscribed. I will allow him to purchase a subscription if he is not subscribed. Is it enough for minimum functionality? (I suspect that these minimum functionality restrictions are old and obsolete, as they sound absurd).
The second question: I want to offer the user a possibility to try the app for free without subscribing at all (Without Store Kit's Free Trial option), because I don't want make the user make a commitment to pay before he tried the app (Apple also doesn't provide a convenient way to cancel the subscription, which may cause abandon-users to be charged even if they don't use the app, which will cause bad reviews etc). So the question is, can I do this without risking my app to get rejected? Does apple allow such kind of Free Trial feature which is managed solely by my server?
Forgive me if this info is somewhere on Apple's docs, but I couldn't find anything related. Thanks!
Okay after sending a query to Apple (Which didn't help me much to understand) and submitting an app to the App Store, I may have an answer:
Apple do allow SaaS apps and did approved my SaaS app. I honestly don't know if they checked my app enough to tell if it is okay but it was approved.
My app implements the Free Trial mechanism without App Store's free trial option. It is clearly written on the registration view controller that the app offers 3 month of free usage without obligation, and then continues without popping and App Store free trial page or something. My app was approved so I guess it is actually okay and within Apple's guidelines.
Hope it'll somehow help someone.
I am developing an app for a client, where he wishes the app to be able to have users to sign up and try out the app for 14 days, after which they have to make a purchase to continue using the app.
My client does not want to absorb Apple's 30% cut for using Apple's in-app purchase mechanism. Initially I suggested implementing a 3rd party payment gateway, but it seems that Apple does not allow app that unlocks app functionalities via a 3rd party payment gateway.
My question is this: if we submit the app that allows users to sign up and login, but only use the app for 14 days without any form of payment mechanisms in the app to allow the user to continue using the app, will the app be rejected? As I was thinking to just have the payment gateway on a website, and during user sign-up, send the user an email informing them that they can go to the website to make a payment.
I know that Apple rejects trial/demo apps, but this is technically a full fledged app where users that purchased via the website will be able to login and perform full functionality. I will also provide Apple with a test account that is fully functional.
Thanks!
Short answer: Apple will reject you if you allow signups and block functionality after a trial period without allowing IAP. Period.
I have first hand knowledge of this, shameless plug in 3..2..1.., Simple In/Out offers a 45 day free trial, after which users are blocked from using the app. In the early days, we escaped Apple's ban hammer by being small and using a blessed trial account that never expired. Apple would review using test account, never see rejection or blocked alerts and prompts to sign up on our website. That did change one day after requesting an expedited review. We got a lot more scrutiny and they rejected us for essentially steering users to our website for subscribing.
The IAP for trials and subscriptions other than magazines is pretty terrible. It is essentially designed for magazines, and that's it. So beware going in. What we eventually did was allow users to subscribe in the app using IAP. Our server manages who is subscribed and who isn't. It also manages which subscription they have (IAP or our own). There is a lot of weird receipt checks you need to do to manage the subscription from Apple. The user is also stuck if they want to change to a bigger/lower subscription plan. Which kinda works for us because the only way to do it is email us, in which we can convert from IAP (-30%) to our own (-2.5% for card processing).
The moral of this story is that if you plan on allowing users to create accounts inside your app, then you will most likely be obligated to offer subscriptions via IAP. If you want to avoid IAP, then you will also need to strip any references to your website from your app and description. They will bust you on meta if you try and steer them around the IAP process. Once we added IAP, we were allowed to point everyone to our website for "more information" in which we are able to convert more users to our own subscription rather than IAP. Right now, our number of our own subscribers vs. Apple is about 75:1. So we don't lose much over the signups we get from Apple.
I believe this should be perfectly fine as long as the 14 day "trial" is a fully functional version of the app.
Your model seems similar to Spotify. Pay for subscription on their website, but use the service in the app.
These resources may help:
https://news.layervault.com/stories/9695-how-do-apps-like-lyft-uber-airbnb-skirt-apples-30-cut-on-each-transaction
http://www.quora.com/How-does-Apple-define-digital-content-when-taking-its-30-cut
In the server side, I'm doing something like:
if(tryIsRealAccount or tryIsSandBoxAccount)
{buy...}
It's a MUST when my app is reviewing by Apple. But should I close sandBox-trying after review?
It may be a silly question, but I really wanna make sure. Thank you!
There isn't any reason to close testing the sandbox - you'll only need to turn it on again next time you submit an app for review (because Apple's reviewers use the sandbox).
Other developers won't be able to use sandbox users to purchase items in your production apps. I just tested it in a production app with my test user credentials, and it doesn't work without payment information:
I am looking to start selling an app on the Apple app store however currently the app uses our own servers to generate a license to the customer once they have purchased it. How can our existing licensing system which uses our own servers be implemented if a customer purchases the app from the App Store instead?
The application license will be a yearly renewable one. Therefore, so far, from what I have read, the app on the App Store could just come with an auto-renewal option (opt-out of course) so that would take care of the subscription cycle but how can our own server issue the customer the one year license which they could then renew from iTunes using the auto-renew function of the App Store?
I am sorry if this is not clear but it would go like this:
Customer downloads application from app store with a one year auto
renewal subscription.
Customer pays.
The app store verifies the
payment.
Once payment is verified it contacts our server to create a
license for that purchase and for one year.
That license is sent back
from our server to the purchased app to unlock the subscription.
Please correct me if my understanding on how this works is wrong but if anyone can point me in the right direction or give examples of how an application on the app store can successfully issue licenses from their own server then I would be very grateful.
As an example, look at "Aviation Exam". They let you buy subscriptions on-device as in-app purchases, or on their own website. In each case the details are synced to a user's account on their own server, so the same exam can be used from any device.
Look at the Apple documentation for how in-app purchase subscriptions work on iOS. Then your app can send details of a purchase to your servers, and download further information.
Edit; after discussion in comments:
If you want payment to go via Apple then it has to be via App Purchase or In-App Purchase. In-App Purchase specifically supports the idea of buying a subscription for a limited time. This is explained at the second link above.
If you want the user to create an account on your server you can either have a page in the app for them to input their details, or you can bring up a web page served from your website. Either way, the info can go to your server and it can create an account.
The key thing is, if payment went via Apple then inside the app is the only place you know this. The app can send this info to your server. You need some common identifier (i.e. a user-name) that is known to your server and to your user, then the user keys it in to your app and it can all be matched up.
There is nothing complicated here, to a decent software developer. All they need is an existence proof such as I gave at the top, and they can figure out how to link the info together.
Edit 2
Some tutorials for in-app purchase listed at: In-App purchase server model
Lots of low-level detail at: Verify receipt for in App purchase
If you prefer to handle payment yourself, not via Apple, then the situation is very different. Now, your own systems have to keep track of what has been bought, when subscriptions run out, etc. To begin with, the app won't know this at all. However, once you identify the user by having them enter credentials (username/password), you can fetch all the details from your back-end system to the app and proceed as above. Again, this is all visible in the example I gave at the beginning, which supports both Apple and non-Apple payments.
One thing to note: if you handle payment yourself then Apple isn't getting its 30% cut, which is the usual App Store commission, so they may not like this. The guidelines say:
11.1 Apps that unlock or enable additional features or functionality with mechanisms other than the App Store will be rejected
11.13 Apps that link to external mechanisms for purchases or subscriptions to be used in the App, such as a "buy" button that goes to a web site to purchase a digital book, will be rejected
That's pretty clear-cut, but since there are apps that rely on subscriptions or content purchased elsewhere, they don't seem to follow these rules in every case. Even the Amazon Kindle app was allowed back, once they took the 'buy' button off.
For these 2 rules:
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.
Is the applicability of these rules reduced/removed if the enablement/disablement of the features/functionality (11.1) or the content purchase (11.2) does not actually occur within the app on the device.
For example, you write an app that requires free registration but if you visit a website outside of the app (and not linked to from the app) to "upgrade" your registration (by paying money) the app gains some more functionality or content next time you use it.
Thoughts?
My thoughts: you'd be violating the guidelines, but your app could get approved, of course. The payment does indeed not occur inside the app, but the application "utilizes" such a system (which is very broad) thus is in violation.
This reminds me of the Newsstand/subscriptions discussions going on before. Basically, if you offer something outside an app, you have to make the same (or better) offer inside the app (via IAP subscriptions). Perhaps this is applicable in your case, too. Although, according to 11.3, you may not offer services outside your app if purchased via IAP (so you may not unlock features on e.g. a website too.)
You'd also try and offer a free app. Once users (somewhere, somehow) upgrade their account, they can access the members only app, a new, separate app. But approval is still questionable, which brings me to my last part:
"We will reject Apps for any content or behavior that we believe is over the line. What line, you ask? Well, as a Supreme Court Justice once said, "I'll know it when I see it". And we think that you will also know it when you cross it."
— https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/
In short: submit, pray and find out.
What you describe sounds similar to the situation that resulted in apps that used Dropbox being rejected (Link). Apple determined that since the apps that used Dropbox functionality required the user to visit the Dropbox site to sign up those apps were in violation of those rules and were thus rejected.