I am unable to complete Apple Developer Program enrollment for our company. Posting the full technical detail here in case others have hit the same failure mode, and because seven weeks of Developer Support has not produced a decline reason.
SYMPTOM: Enrollment checkout returns "Your payment authorisation failed on card ••••XXXX. Please verify your information and try again, or try another payment method."
Apple Pay is greyed out on the same checkout page with "Items in your order are not eligible for this payment method."
KEY DETAIL: My bank confirms that NO authorization request from Apple ever reaches the card issuer, on any attempt, on any card. The decline is occurring inside Apple's payment system before the card network is contacted. This rules out an issuer-side decline.
TRIED:
- Multiple different cards (all work normally for other purchases)
- Safari, Chrome, Edge, Opera
- iPhone, Windows desktop, Windows Server
- Multiple network locations
Identical failure every time.
PROVIDED TO SUPPORT: Exact timestamps, browser versions, OS versions, DSSID2 session cookie, full screen recording of the checkout and failure, bank confirmation of zero inbound authorization requests.
CASE STATUS: Support case 102916130114 — four advisors over seven weeks. Engineering ticket INC102862067 — open three weeks, no preliminary finding, no decline reason, no ETA provided.
CONTEXT: The same company is already verified and publishing on Google Play, including D-U-N-S verification and successful developer payment there. So the entity, the D-U-N-S record, and our ability to make card payments are all externally verified.
ASK: Has anyone encountered an enrollment payment that fails upstream of the card network like this? And is there any route to obtain the actual decline reason from Apple's payment processor? Support advisors have consistently said they cannot see it.