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When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

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Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#51

Does this mean if there's a developer I don't like, I can buy their stuff and refund it to arbitrarily cost them money at no cost to myself and there's nothing they can do about it? That seems ... not great, especially these days. What happens when mobs of internet morons decide review bombing isn't sufficient and realize Apple will help them cause direct financial harm instead?

If you do this often Apple will ban your account. If you don't do this often it's not a problem.

What if you have a big Twitter following and ask them to do it?

Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#52

Seems fair to me. Apple provided with you a service and charged your for it. It is a cost associated with distributing / developing your product. Why should Apple be responsible for refunding you? It was not their fault that the customer decided their money back.

Apple prices the exact same things into hardware distribution too, but when you ask for your money back there they give it back in full, not minus the “service” they already provided you.

And I think that’s great! I just don’t think they need to be forced to do it. If I were Apple I would definitely refund. But I don’t agree that it should be an obligation for them to do it.

Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#53
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where this analogy fails is that shipping is not a fixed percent of a product cost. And the cost of refund is the same to Apple for a product that cost $1 just as it is for products that cost $100.

My point is that the fee is about “delivering you the customer”. Apple delivered you the customer. That the customer and you were unhappy is no bearing on their ability to deliver that customer to you.

They didn't deliver a customer. They delivered a non-customer.

Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#54
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except apple's marginal cost like 0.

Marginal cost is often not a good way to evaluate things. A person who focuses only on marginal cost will say "It only took you an hour to make that" while discounting the decades of training it took to be able to. A person who focuses only on marginal cost will say "I could have made this at home" while discounting the reasons why they didn't. Prices relate to provided value, not just cost.

How much value is provided for a refund?

Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#55

App stores need heavy regulations. It's not only Apple but Google and even steam to a small extent. Apple is of course the biggest offender as they heavily guard their monopoly with code signing enforcement. This shouldn't have been legal. They are the very definitions of predatory competition squashing monopolies.

The only heavy regulation I need is the device is fully mine after I buy it. I'll take care of the rest.

Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#56
post #43
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Competitive between developers and perhaps platforms but absolutely a monopoly for iOS.

This is as nonsensical as complaining about Disney having a monopoly in Disneyland.

Phones are not the private property of Apple and Google.

Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#57
post #2

Well yeah, I still need to pay shipping for amazon to send me a product even if I need to return it because it's broken. I would have no product to return if I did not pay for the shipping to receive the product. Apple would justify that 30% being non-refundable by saying "you would have never had that client to refund if you did not give us that 30%". They did their job, they got you the client, you were the one who…

Apple is not giving a 70% refund when you refund an app. They are giving a full refund and charging the seller for the 30%.

In your analogy, it would be like giving the toll back and charging a portion of it to the bridge builder.

Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#58
post #11

App stores need heavy regulations. It's not only Apple but Google and even steam to a small extent. Apple is of course the biggest offender as they heavily guard their monopoly with code signing enforcement. This shouldn't have been legal. They are the very definitions of predatory competition squashing monopolies.

Why do app stores need separate regulations? > They are the very definitions of predatory competition squashing monopolies. But they aren’t, this is a rather competitive space.

Oh, really? Which competitors to Apple are there on iOS?

Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#59

App stores need heavy regulations. It's not only Apple but Google and even steam to a small extent. Apple is of course the biggest offender as they heavily guard their monopoly with code signing enforcement. This shouldn't have been legal. They are the very definitions of predatory competition squashing monopolies.

A simple regulation that would fix this without overbearing price controls is to require manufacturers to allow users to sideload their own app stores.

Re: When a customer refunds your paid app, Apple refunds its 30% cut [edited]

#60
post #37
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do app stores need separate regulations? > They are the very definitions of predatory competition squashing monopolies. But they aren’t, this is a rather competitive space.

It seems like a pretty clear duopoly to me, Apple and Android are the only two mobile platforms, and rather than compete with each other on price they are just both leaving their cut at 30%. Personally it’s not even the 30% I mind so much as, maybe there are cool new products like new mobile browsers that are just forbidden by the app stores and so we will never get them.

Amazon appstore, F-droid, Huawei app store, Samsung Galaxy Apps and so on.
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