Auto-Renewable Subscription Upgrade Failure

We are trying to implement an Auto-Renewable Subscriptions for our APP as following:

Subscription Group:

1 month

3 month

1 year

User purchases 1 month Subscription with IAP. This is successful.
User upgrades to 3 month Subscription with IAP. User hits confirm, and the iTunes Store processes as successful but nothing actually happens. No transaction takes place and the user never actually pays anything here even though they hit Confirm Purchase.


App Store Connect Sales Report reports transaction is successful but no payment took place. From what I understand for subscription upgrades, there should be an immediate payment followed by a new effective subscription date.

We found out that for the user, it leaves this 3 month subscription as Pending under the Manage Subscriptions tab.

Need some help to troubleshoot this issue.


Thank you very much!


Replies

The user has paid for a one month renewable subscription, say on October 1st. That means they have paid through November 1st. On October 15th they upgrade to a 3 month renewable. What do you expect to happen?


What happens is that their '3 month' upgrade is recorded immediately and when the current subscription expires on November 1st they get a renewal for 3 months.

If the 1 month subscription is active, then there is an attempt to purchase a 3 month subscription, but nothing happens, I wonder whether the 3 month subscription is a downgrade. If you review the subscription group for the app, where is the 1 month item listed in relationship to the 3 month item. If the 1 month item is listed atop the 3 month item, then the 3 month item is a downgrade to the 1 month item. I refer you to the note at the top of the subscription group listing


"Arrange your subscriptions in descending order, starting with the option that offers the highest level of service. You can add more than one subscription to each level. This order will determine your subscription’s upgrade and downgrade options."


The behavior you describe sounds like the 3 month item is a downgrade of the 1 month subscription. As PBK stated and per the App Store Connect help on auto-renewable subscription items

<https://help.apple.com/app-store-connect/#/dev7f2d6b652>

Downgrade. When a customer switches from a subscription in a higher level to a subscription in a lower level. Customers will be billed the new rate on their next renewal date.


rich kubota - rkubota@apple.com

developer technical support CoreOS/Hardware/MFI

Dear PBK,

Thanks for the response, but I am noticing something a little different.


From what I read on the store before confirming the purchase, it says:

Confirm Purchase
Do you want to upgrade to the 1 Year Subscription at $0.99? Your upgrade will start now. You'll receive a refund for the remaining time of your 1-month subscription to your 3 Month Subscription.

From what I understand from this, in continuing from your current example, what I would expect is:
Current 1 month renewable subscription is cancelled as of today (Oct 15th.)
3 month renewable subscription begins on the start with the new effective date being today so that the new 3 month subscription would start on October 15th instead of November 1st and end on January 15th.
Is this correct?

My other question would be when the start of the 3 month renewable subscription begins, would the user be charged immediately or would this be delayed?

Thanks for the help.

Dear Rich,

Thank you for the response. I have checked now, the 1 month subscription is active, and the 3 month is above the 1 month subscription. So, I just wanted to get some clarification on when the customer is charged. If a customer upgrades from a lower level (1 month) to a higher level (3 month) I know itunes will start the 3 month subscription immediately from the day the upgrade was purchased. My question is, when will the customer be charged for this upgrade? Some of my subscribers are saying they are not being charged immediately when they upgrade. Instead they have been receiving a receipt from Apple after 3 to 4 business days. Is this correct? If not, why is there a delay in the payment being processed on Apple's side?
I find it strange that the user is receiving a refund for the lower level subscription (1 month) on the actual date of the upgrade, but the charge for the upgrade for the higher level subscription (3 months) doesn't happen until 3 or 4 business days after.


Thank you for the help.

But how can you issue a refund for a partial period? You can’t. So either 1) the new subscription must auto start when the old subscription expires or 2) the new subscription is deemed to have started when the old subscription started and the old subscription is either a) fully refunded with the new subscription fully charged or b) credited towards the price of the new subscription. I do not know which occurs.

hello richhj


You asked - My question is, when will the customer be charged for this upgrade?

Response - this is a question for App Store Connect. The App Store billing process is managed by the App Store server team. To my understanding, billing for an upgrade is charged immediately.


The app process can determine when the customer is charged by reviewing the validated appStoreReceipt to find the purchase_date field for the most recent renewal.


You also asked -"Some of my subscribers are saying they are not being charged immediately when they upgrade. Instead they have been receiving a receipt from Apple after 3 to 4 business days. Is this correct?"

Response - this is again an App Store Connect issue to respond to. I support the use of the StoreKit API to process In-App Purchases. How the billing process works is not a part of the API. I do understand the desire to understand how billing occurs. The best I can provide is information on how the app process can detect that billing has occurred and that the user has a current subscription in place.


You indicated "I find it strange that the user is receiving a refund for the lower level subscription (1 month) on the actual date of the upgrade, but the charge for the upgrade for the higher level subscription (3 months) doesn't happen until 3 or 4 business days after."

Response - I don't have access to your App Store Connect records, but I wonder whether the 3 month subscription is actually an upgrade. This may or may not be the case for your app, but the order of identifiers as they are listed in the App Store Connect records determines whether auto-renewable subscription items are upgrades or downgrades. The highest listed item is the highest grade item. So for example if I have the following items listed


one_month

three_month

annual


The one_month item is an upgrade over the three_month and annual items. The duration of the auto-renewable subscription does not define whether an item is an upgrade or a downgrade. Per the list you presented in the original post, if a user switches from a one month subscription to a three month subscription, that is a downgrade. The switch from the one month subscription to three month would occur when the one month subscription expires. However if the three month subscription is active and the user purchases the one month subscription, this would be an upgrade and would happen immediately. For me it would help to see how things are defined in the App Store Connect records.


For all billing questions, please submit your questions via the App Store Connect "Contact Us" button.


rich kubota - rkubota@apple.com

developer technical support CoreOS/Hardware/MFI