Hi, I will list my experience with my app so far and apple review / support, this is definitely a really bad experience, that harms my app and all the investment I did for it. This is NOT what I would have expected when I paid the 99 dollars. Worth to mention that those 99 dollars are not the biggest part of the investment, the team working behind the app, the server side development, and others have their cost and the potential business opportunity I pursue by releasing this app is being broken due to Apple lack of answers to my situation.
- On May 12th we submitted the very first version of our app for review.
- On May 13th we got feedback to add some extra Meta data, and we corrected it.
- On May 14th, the app was approved, and published.
Till now, everything was a really good experience and what I would consider a "normal" review experience... but then the bad situation started:
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On May 15th, we submitted an update for review.
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We did not have any answer ever from Apple for many days... then on May 21st I created a support ticket.
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There was NO ANSWER on the support ticket yet.
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We got our first feedback on May 26th (11 days after submission), again a Meta data issue, that we corrected right away, and re submitted for review, expecting a quick answer on it.
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Again no answer whatsoever from the review team.
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On June 2nd (12 days after I submitted the support ticket) I got an email on that support ticket:
"We can assure you that your app has not been forgotten and is proceeding through the review process."
This seemed like a joke. We decided to wait an extra day ... even when we were sitting on several improvements and bug fixes of the app.
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On June 3rd, 9AM GTM+2, after not been able to wait any longer, I did cancelled the previous submit (the one from May 15th), in order to submit an updated version of the app with improvements and bug fixes and requested the review to be expedited.
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That same day, a bit later, I got another email from apple support:
"... We are currently experiencing a high volume of requests from our developers, and your patience is greatly appreciated. Yesterday your app was expedited.
We noticed that you have rejected your app on at least one occasion. When you reject and resubmit your binary, your expected review time will once again be 24 hours. ..."
- I have replied that email on June 4th and yet another answer on June 5th ... I got not answer whatsoever.
I am still waiting for the review I submitted on June 3rd, that supposedly is being expedited ...
I do need that out by tomorrow Wednesday 10th.
On today's time, on a new app release, it is really bad for Apple to not provide the mechanism to get an update out in a whole 4 weeks... I imagine that this is not a common case ... but then again, I do not understand what makes my app the exception ... and the lack of any answer from Apple does not help.