Hi,
We are developing an App for a Mobile Telecom Operator (someone like your Verizon, Vodafone, Orange..).
As a Telecom operator they sell a number of services that get charged directly on the phone bill, or gets deducted from users pre-paid balance.
With regulations around in-app purchases and restrictions on selling content items outside the app-store, I was wondering if there are any clear answers on what is allowed or not?
More specifically, the questions are:
If a telecom operator’s bundle features are activated/deactivated through an iOS app (through operators own charging mechanism), will Apple’s appstore accept it in after the app is submitted to the appstore?
If a telecom product (Music Service, Mobile-TV service, Value added Services like Sports Alerts, Weather alerts) is activated/deactivated through the app, will Apple’s appstore has any objection in its approval process?
The telecom operator has a 'Subscription' product for various digital services like 'Alert SMS'. This subscription is charged on the bill/pre-paid balance weekly or monthly. Any issues if we offer this to be sold on the App?
The telecom operator has some products that allow sharing of content items e.g. I can buy a ringback tone for a friend. Would this raise any issues as per guidelines?
Having said above, I've seen already published Apps from various Telecom operators that do all the above, so I assume they are 'allowed'. But I need to have more confidence that this will be the case as the guidelines around these 'intangibles' is not very clear (to me at least).
regards,
Ali Shah