iphone app £60 sting WARNING for parents

stuymac

Parents whose children use their iphone or ipod touch to play games beware. While playing Tap Zoo on my ipod touch - my 6 year old daughter managed to buy a trunk of stars for £59.99 (that's right £60 for some virtual stars) with one click. I had just downloaded an app update, so she did not need a password.

To be fair to Itunes, they have responded to my email quickly and agreed to refund the money.

They have advised me to take the following action to stop this happening in the future:

If you would like to prevent in-app purchases from being made in the future, you can block them on your iOS device. Follow these steps:

1) Tap Settings on your device's home screen.

2) Tap General.

3) Tap Restrictions.

4) If necessary, tap Enable Restrictions and enter a passcode. This passcode will prevent restrictions from being disabled without your permission.

5) Scroll down to the Allowed Content section. Switch the In-App Purchases option to OFF. Enter your Restrictions passcode if prompted.

I hope this advice saves a few parents from the shock we had.

bris

There are a few games like this, mostly free to download so there is no way kid is going to read the small print that says the virtual money will be coming of the parents credit card. This is why I didn't use one to set up my kids accounts.

anna_p86

Ouch! Thanks for that, I am pretty careful about these things but my god-son plays on it & this could easily happen:eek:

Good on itunes as well.

Greensprout

Worth a read..

http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-Wireless/Apple-Sued-By-Dad-Over-InApp-Purchases-Policy-230454/

Snakeeyes21

So how is this anybodys fault but your own? you downoaded the game, you gave your child permission to use it, you presumably knew you could buy extras within the game, you took no action to prevent this, and you have ripped off an honest game developer for your lack of parenting skills, nice one, give yourself a pat on the back.

Lets hope your child doesnt grow up with the same attitude as you, where its anybodys fault but yours.

You may aswell have taken your child in to a shop and taught her how to shoplift and told her theres nothing wrong with doing it.

Idiophreak

Snakeeyes21 wrote: »

you have ripped off an honest game developer

How's that, exactly?

jayme1

if you can update the iDevice to the latest software as apple have made the iDevice forget the password now so problems line this cannot happen anymore

more info here

basically up until this point it was always in apples interest to allow accidental in app purchases because they took a 30% cut in it. now they have thankfully put a stop to it.