I don't know how monthly subscriptions work, but yearly subscription refunds are pro-rated.
> I'm surprised more people don't do one-time purchases to avoid these subscription refund stories I keep hearing
I'm not, at least not for apps like this that need consistent revenue to support regular maintenance and/or server costs in an era where customers balk when an app costs more than a few dollars. To achieve this you end up balancing whether or not to serve ads, hope you can just grow enough new users forever, charge for major updates, charge a subscription, or beg for tips. While there are some exceptions, you can probably tell that ads or subscriptions are generally winning this nowadays.
One-time purchases are a tricky thing, since you've realisitcally now precluded ever charging for a major update. This is great for them, and might be for you if you've gotten your math right, but if you haven't (or it changes) then you're stuck. And, for better or for worse, they tend to be the loudest users.
Marco Arment talks about this balance in general on an episode of the Accidental Tech Podcast a couple weeks ago when discussing how Casey (another host) should price an app he's writing. For context if folks aren't aware, Marco created Overcast, which is a popular 3rd party iOS podcast app. The discussion spans a couple episodes but I the post-show of [Episode 535](https://atp.fm/535) captures the gist.
> Also worth noting it is really, really trivial to cancel an app subscription from within your Settings, and to see much of the trial period is remaining.
And yet people still miss it and send us angry emails when they're billed, and we have to tell them to ask Apple for their refund since we don't have the capability to refund them ourselves.
Here's an example a friend of mine ran into recently:
They sold their company and shut down their service for which they charged monthly/yearly subscriptions. They had a decent relationship with Apple, so they emailed their contact and notified them that they'd like to issue refunds to all their users. Apple said that users had to do it themselves. That wouldn't be so bad, but there's (as I understand it) some restrictions on Apple offering refunds for subscriptions, for example if you're 25 days into a 30 day subscription period, Apple won't allow users to request a refund.
This caused users to get angry at my friend and their company.
If they had been using any other payment service other than the App Store, they could have just automatically issued refunds to all their users.
> with each subscription comes a business relationship you have to manage, which is annoying and prone to being forgotten
Though, this is one advantage of centralized services like Paypal and the iOS ecosystem.
At any time, I can see the iOS apps that are auto-billing me and I can rescind the contract from that UI. I don't need to call anyone or hope their <button>Cancel</button> actually does anything. I don't need to watch my statement like a hawk just to make sure they actually stopped billing me or that the 7-day trial that I canceled actually canceled.
Anyone can complain about yet another subscription. But tools that help us stay on top of our subscriptions are essential for subscriptions that aren't a bad deal. The banking/financial industry stopped evolving long ago and should have built ubiquitous tools for this.
Finally, the complaints about subscription services in this thread aren't very compelling. Nobody wants to buy a subscription yet the app transaction they want on their terms (e.g. buy once, never expire) presumably doesn't exist. It's a pebble's throw from just complaining that you'd prefer if everything was free so that you could keep your hard earned money.
Aside, iOS doesn't go far enough. Just so I don't seem like I'm too kind to Apple and subscription services here, they still have a long way to go. If they cared more about consumer protection, they would enact these changes:
1) iOS notification every time we get auto-billed. Every time we get charged, we should get reminded to consider if we actually want the subscription and that people aren't just getting taken advantage of by forgetting. iOS does nicely show you your auto-renewing subscriptions, but my parents don't know how to access it.
2) nuke the ability for weekly charges. A monthly billing cycle should be the minimum because that's what people are used to. It's kinda disgusting that an app can charge $7/wk when 99.9% of auto-renew cycles are monthly, and the user has to happen to notice the "wk" when they agree to it. And if weekly billing is allowed, then the iOS pricing page should standardize it showing you how much that costs per month to make it clear that it's not $7/mo.
3) An app shouldn't be able to default to the yearly billing cycle, it should default to monthly and the user can choose a yearly cycle if they want to, ugh. So many apps will default to the yearly cycle (so, 12*fee upfront) and even require you to pick that one if you want the 7-day free trial. It's hard to see how Apple could design the system to allow this behavior without knowing it's going to make people commit to a billing cycle they don't actually want.
4) You shouldn't be able to display a full-screen interstitial that makes it seem like you have to subscribe to use the app. I was just looking for a good daily workout iPhone app this week and every app had a full-screen splash page where you had to notice the tiny "X" to skip.
That said, still better than the US system where giving someone your debit card number in 2021 lets them pull money from your account for years just because you bought a $3 hotdog from them once.
Last time I checked (admittedly a long time on Apple, as a developer, I couldn't refund and cancel a subscription for my customers. They have to go through Apple to do that. Not a great experience.
The problem is not really subscriptions, it's being able to enter and leave a subscription without hassle, something that is increasingly difficult these days. If you're paying for an ongoing service, then it makes sense to pay a monthly fee. But if you're paying for an app and don't expect significant long-term upgrades, then yes, a one-time purchase makes sense.
In theory, iOS implements this well by allowing you to unsubscribe with one click. In practice, it's a terrible UX. Just try finding the subscriptions page in Settings and you'll see what I mean.
This is the way I use most subscription products. There are a lot of pieces of software that I think do actually make sense to charge a subscription for rather than a one-time payment; almost all the software I use daily in 2023 has some kind of server-side component or ongoing maintenance/development costs and I don't mind paying for that. It's the auto-renewal aspect and all the dark patterns associated with cancellation that I really despise.
One thing that I do now is try to use iOS to initiate subscriptions as much as possible, since the Apple-mandated subscription mechanism there lets me easily and immediately cancel auto-renewals for a new subscription as soon as I sign up for it.
I don't love that the walled garden approach seems to be the only way to restore sanity here and would love to see something standards-track and cross platform emerge for signing up for, listing, and cancelling software subscriptions in one place as part of the functionality provided by your OS. Basically, "passkeys for subscriptions". Maybe someday!
I have been using a microsubscription model for an MMO strategy game for iPhone/Android that I helped develop. (http://spaceuncharted.com) We charge $1/month or $10/year for access to the full game. Here are some things we've learned:
-- Apple only allows auto-renewing subscriptions for magazines, newspapers and other periodicals. So, for us, users have to re-subscribe every month, which has lead to very poor retention rates. On Android, we use auto-renewing Paypal subscriptions, and have had more success.
-- Having to manage separate billing systems for iPhone and Android adds a lot of development time and headaches. The Apple billing system is particularly time consuming because the errors you get if something isn't configured just right are not helpful.
-- Subscribers can have very high expectations for a service that is costs $1/month. When they're paying, they (rightly) demand a high quality product. We've been very liberal with giving out refunds or credits when bugs have arisen or we've had server downtime.
Apple's approach isn't as bad as this title makes it sound.
Mostly because they're aggressive communicators about subscription billing -- they send emails well in advance of any subscription renewal, telling you when you'll be billed, how much for, and giving you a link to cancel the subscription. Makes me feel this isn't them hoping you'll just forget and be billed.
In fact, I'd suspect this is intended as a user-friendly feature. It means you had to be presented with the cost up-front before you began the trial, avoiding letting shadier developers do a bait and switch when the trial expires and the user needs to sign up again. (Not saying there aren't other ways this could be done, but...)
I don’t care about trillion dollar company. I care about my experience. App Store purchases and subscriptions are a good experience for a user. I’ve never had problems canceling subscriptions, or getting refunds.
My experience was rather different. I purchased a constellation app (full price no subscription) and after owning it for a year the developer decided to go to a subscription model. I was never told about this until I noticed a monthly charge from apple. Super slimy behavior, I was pretty frustrated. I sent a request to have my charge refunded which apple obliged. In general I really dislike this type of auto-charging and it seems like it preys on customers who are not watching their statements very closely. But Apple is not incentivized as they get a cut of this money.
>Do you want to get out of the trial and avoid getting charged? Well, that's a problem, an obstacle course for consumers.
I'm sorry what? Settings -> Apple ID & Purchases -> Subscriptions -> Choose subscription -> Cancel Subscription
Or if going into the phone settings to manage your app store subscriptions doesn't make sense to you, there's also App Store -> Account -> Subscriptions -> Choose subscription -> Cancel subscription
It even tells you both when the subscription renews and how long you can keep using the features for even if you unsubscribe. Once you unsubscribe that's it. Since the purchases go through Apple, unsubscribing means the developer can't pull a Comcast and "forget".
I even just now grabbed and app and started a "free 1 month trial" for their service. It shows up in the same subscription list and tells me when it will renew and how much it will charge me. If I tell it to cancel the free trial, it even lets me know that I can continue to access the trial services until the end of the trial period next month.
How is any of that "an obstacle course"? Yes, I agree that it would be nice if trials defaulted to not auto-renewing or you were given a choice when starting a subscription. But managing what you're subscribed to is about as simple as it gets.
Maybe the author is talking about an app that you subscribe to outside of the app store (e.g. Netflix or Spotify style). Certainly I can appreciate that you can lose track of your subscription there, but I fail to see how apple has any responsibility for "not protecting" you if you don't actually go through their processes for being protected.
Exactly. This year, a bunch of iOS apps switched from one-and-done to subscription plans. If you want to re-monetize your app, the other option is selling it, I guess.
This is why consumers like easily-cancelled subscriptions, which iOS implemented. It was important to implement easy cancellations on iOS to show how you can cancel any time so you're not being defrauded when small utilities, kids games etc discretely charge $500/year with Apple's approval. It's your fault for not canceling the subscription that costs 200x more than the app did last year.
I have forgotten to cancel subscriptions from iTunes a few times as I tend to watch my CC statement for forgotten subscriptions, not Apple Free Trial emails. The real issue is that they make it impossible to get a refund once you as a customer have been charged even when the app developer agrees to give you one. Being forced to delegate billing to a robotic corporation that treats your customers like robots is a terrible position to force developers in to.
I can live with subscriptions, though part of me rebels at it. But I really dislike software that makes me pay ahead of time to even try it. This isn't exactly common, but it is seen at least on the Apple app store. In a world where subscription models are so common, what makes it hard to give me a 7 or 30 day trial before I have to put out money? I've had to ask Apple for money back three or four times, and that is both a drain on my time and attention as well as (possibly) some poor schmuck at Apple.
> There’s a slight catch here: According to 9to5Mac, the discount is only good while the customer’s other subscription is active. So if someone tries an app because it offered a deal and decides to cancel the other subscription, they’ll go back to the normal price.
Does this ruin the appeal a little bit? I feel like most customers wouldn’t really appreciate this. They’d probably like to see the discount through some kind of period of time…e.g., “Subscribers to X, subscribe to Y and get 50% off your first 6 months.”
Seems like poaching a competitor’s subscriber is going to immediately pull the rug out from under the customer and piss them off.
I don't really share OP's impressions. I think the move to the subscription model is one of the best things that happened to our industry in the recent years.
It's a model which lets you sustainably sell software and keep working on it, delivering updates, etc.
The pay per update model forces the creator to release big feature updates, even if the features are just bloat, as bug fix releases and stability work will usually sell much worse. That's mostly fixed by the subscription model.
I don't see how these are user hostile.
Yeah, subscriptions that are hard to cancel are bad. But that's just a scam, not an inherent problem with subscriptions. I can go and cancel any subscription I have in a few clicks - with the best experience being in the Apple App Store, where I have a single place to manage all subscriptions paid through the App Store.
I will risk an avalanche of downvotes and steel man Apple's argument. :)
Have you ever gotten stuck with a monthly fee for something that's hard to cancel? It's a real pain the butt, no?
But that never really happens on Apple devices, because Apple makes it incredibly easy to cancel subscriptions. You don't have to call anyone, you don't have to struggle with a bad website -- you just click cancel on your phone and it's done. And it's all in one place too -- no bank statement required.
They are also a check on other dark patterns, like silently increasing charges without a clear notification to customers. I don't even get spammed because Apple proxies my emails from app developers.
One of the main reasons I buy things from Apple (on my device) and Amazon (if it's a physical good) is so that I have a company I sorta trust to do the right thing if things go sideways (cancelations, returns, fraud, etc.).
Once every app developer is pushing me to enter my credit card on their website, that all goes out the window. Dark patterns common on the web and on Android will take over the iOS ecosystem too.
I also am going to take an unpopular opinion and say that Apple probably earns that fee. The fact that Android isn't that valuable to app developers proves that Apple's reputation and standards are what drives a lot of their app store revenue. App devs feel like they're providing all the value, but I suspect it's often not truly the case. I know this is an unpopular opinion amongst us devs.
I don't even know if I truly buy these arguments, but I thought it'd be more interesting here if there was at least one comment defending Apple.
I don't know how monthly subscriptions work, but yearly subscription refunds are pro-rated.
> I'm surprised more people don't do one-time purchases to avoid these subscription refund stories I keep hearing
I'm not, at least not for apps like this that need consistent revenue to support regular maintenance and/or server costs in an era where customers balk when an app costs more than a few dollars. To achieve this you end up balancing whether or not to serve ads, hope you can just grow enough new users forever, charge for major updates, charge a subscription, or beg for tips. While there are some exceptions, you can probably tell that ads or subscriptions are generally winning this nowadays.
One-time purchases are a tricky thing, since you've realisitcally now precluded ever charging for a major update. This is great for them, and might be for you if you've gotten your math right, but if you haven't (or it changes) then you're stuck. And, for better or for worse, they tend to be the loudest users.
Marco Arment talks about this balance in general on an episode of the Accidental Tech Podcast a couple weeks ago when discussing how Casey (another host) should price an app he's writing. For context if folks aren't aware, Marco created Overcast, which is a popular 3rd party iOS podcast app. The discussion spans a couple episodes but I the post-show of [Episode 535](https://atp.fm/535) captures the gist.
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