What is the recommended procedure for removing/deleting an app that does not have any approved builds from iTunes Connect?

I'm facing the following problem: We have accumulated a number of throw-away/prototype iOS Apps under our iTunes Connect account. Those apps were never meant for distribution or sale, hence they don't have any "approved builds".


I noticed the article on "Transferring and Deleting Apps" states: "You can delete your app if there is at least one approved version of the app..."

(I'm interpreting "approved version" to mean "having successfully passed the App Store review process".)


So, here are my questions:


  • What is the reasoning behind this policy of preventing developers from deleting unpublished/unreviewed apps?
  • What is the recommended procedure for deleting those kinds of apps? (Should we submit a dummy build for review? What if it gets rejected?)

Accepted Reply

Ok, turns out I needed to contact the iTunes Connect Team instead of Developer Technical Support (DTS).

Anyways, here is the official answer from Apple:


"We want to confirm for you that you will need a version of your app that has passed the review process and been approved by our App Review team prior to being able to delete this app. [...] We have taken your request to delete apps without approved versions as feedback for a future enhancement of iTunes Connect".

Replies

I would love to know the answer, too!

Since I'm not getting any helpful replies, I'm going to submit this question as a Technical Support Incident. Will post the answere here.

Ok, turns out I needed to contact the iTunes Connect Team instead of Developer Technical Support (DTS).

Anyways, here is the official answer from Apple:


"We want to confirm for you that you will need a version of your app that has passed the review process and been approved by our App Review team prior to being able to delete this app. [...] We have taken your request to delete apps without approved versions as feedback for a future enhancement of iTunes Connect".

Hi,


I did not realise it was nearly impossible to delete apps before I added a few when playing around with things. Now I have 5 apps that just sits there in the "Prepare for submission" state.


You mentioned you contacted the "iTunes Connect Team" ? How does one go about to contact them ? 🙂


Cheers,

Niklas

Yea, can you give us an email address or soemthing? The Contact Us link doesn't actually involve contacting them. Stuff like this really makes me enjoy working with you Apple.

Apple Developer Relations:


(800) 633 2152

(408) 974 4897

Worldwide Phone Number List: https://developer.apple.com/contact/phone.php

Quick update:


On August 8th 2015, I filed the following iTunes Connect Bug (#22201501) through https://bugreport.apple.com:


"It is currently impossible to delete an app that does not have any approved builds from iTunes Connect. I am suggesting to add a new option/feature to iTunes connect that would enable me to do this."


One year later, on August 11th 2016, I received the following reply from Apple Developer Relations:


Thank you for your feedback. At this time there are no plans to address this.

We are closing this bug report.

If you have questions regarding the resolution of this issue, please update your bug report with that information.

Please be sure to regularly check new Apple releases for any updates that might affect this issue.

The following URL leads to a contact form you can use to get in touch with the iTunes Connect Team:

http://www.apple.com/itunes/go/itunesconnect/contactus