7 ms·

Not saying it's exactly the same situation, but Stripe keeps their fees when you refund a payment

gerbal 6y ago
This is also common for most credit card processors. But keeping 3% is very different from 30%
dawnerd 6y ago
It’s pretty common across the board. 30% is really high for sure, but payment processors gotta get paid at some point. I think Apple should split the fee up. Make a portion what they charge for processing payments and the rest their commission.
- glofish 6y ago
  correct, there is a huge difference between taking 3% and 30% one is the cost of doing business, the other is predatory
  - briandear 6y ago
    You aren’t required to sell apps for Apple platforms. Has anyone even looked at what it takes to make and sell console games? Do you know how much manufacturers earn on products sold in grocery stores? Far less than 50% of the retail price. When distributors are involved, it’s even less. The company that makes a bar of soap might get paid $1, the distributor gets $1 and the retailer sells it for $3 and has the right to return unsold product. And shipping costs aren’t included in these amounts. The manufacturer gets $1 but also has to pay shipping to the distributor. People complaining about 30% have no idea how real world businesses operate. They are in some kind of fantasyland. Don’t forget, the App Store also handles your worldwide sales tax payments, fraud protection, chargebacks, hosting, distribution, your storefront, your payment processing and gives you worldwide availability for your app in the specific local currencies. If those services aren’t of value to you, then don’t sell apps for iOS. Certainly Windows Phone has some users, or perhaps create your own device and ecosystem that offers terms you find more amenable. This is Hacker News, not crybaby news: you don’t like the status quo, then get some friends, start making a better system, raise some money, then compete. If you think 30% is predatory, then make a system that only charges $what_you_think_is_fair. As far as Stripe, they take more than 3%. And for connect accounts, the percentage is closer to 3.5% not to mention you get charged $15 or $20 for a chargeback. What’s Apple charge developers for chargebacks? Zero. How often do developers have to challenge chargebacks with Apple? Zero. If you are selling using Stripe, it can become a significant expense, depending on your industry, especially gaming. It’s my feeling that people complaining about 30% have no idea of the expense of “doing it themselves.”
    - thoraway1010 6y ago
      Retail is crazy miserable for the person actually MAKING the product. Getting INTO stores is hard. The store can dump product back onto you - so they have no risk. The price on shelf has NOTHING to do with what you get, if you are small you are already going through some intermediaries. Ie, person making product, packing, shipping to distributor (some make you pay cost to get it to them), then distribution costs then retailer markups then return handling yadda yadda. THEN retailers will ask you to run promos and give them discounts or they will drop you. 3%? EVERYONE would pay that. In retail I'd say person making product gets maybe 20%? 80% is taken by others?
sukilot 6y ago
It's not the same at all. Payment processing is work, regardless of direction. Marketing fees for non-sales is payment for nothing.
- andrewxdiamond 6y ago
  ....but Apple processes payments for App Store purchases? And they pay to maintain the store. Storage, bandwidth, updates, those are all “work” as well. I do think 30% is quite high, but this comment seems to consider Apple a charity house that should provide these services for free
  - R0b0t1 6y ago
    Despite the fluid nature of consideration in contract law there are checks to ensure you can't demand $5000 for a single aspirin. That seems like it'd come into play here. The 30% only makes sense in the context of it paying for more than payment processing, and consequently if the marketing wasn't effective I'd not pay for it.
  - latortuga 6y ago
    Don't forget that Apple takes a yearly developer license. You're claiming that the 30% cut that they keep on a refund is used to cover payment processing (typically priced around 3%) and the marginal cost of the bandwidth to distribute that single copy of the app? Even for $0.99 apps that price is outrageously expensive. AWS, notorious for their high bandwidth pricing, costs ~2 cents per GB on S3. This is 33 cents for a dozen MB. Nobody is saying Apple shouldn't get paid here, but keeping 30% is insane.
    - andrewxdiamond 6y ago
      A product or service is worth what people will pay, not what it costs.
  - sushid 6y ago
    Why are there so many pro bono Apple defenders for this? They literally are taking 30% when a user buys an app and 30% when they are refunding it. 30% is quite high? It's highway robbery!

This is also common for most credit card processors. But keeping 3% is very different from 30%

It’s pretty common across the board. 30% is really high for sure, but payment processors gotta get paid at some point. I think Apple should split the fee up. Make a portion what they charge for processing payments and the rest their commission.

glofish 6y ago
correct, there is a huge difference between taking 3% and 30% one is the cost of doing business, the other is predatory
- briandear 6y ago
  You aren’t required to sell apps for Apple platforms. Has anyone even looked at what it takes to make and sell console games? Do you know how much manufacturers earn on products sold in grocery stores? Far less than 50% of the retail price. When distributors are involved, it’s even less. The company that makes a bar of soap might get paid $1, the distributor gets $1 and the retailer sells it for $3 and has the right to return unsold product. And shipping costs aren’t included in these amounts. The manufacturer gets $1 but also has to pay shipping to the distributor. People complaining about 30% have no idea how real world businesses operate. They are in some kind of fantasyland. Don’t forget, the App Store also handles your worldwide sales tax payments, fraud protection, chargebacks, hosting, distribution, your storefront, your payment processing and gives you worldwide availability for your app in the specific local currencies. If those services aren’t of value to you, then don’t sell apps for iOS. Certainly Windows Phone has some users, or perhaps create your own device and ecosystem that offers terms you find more amenable. This is Hacker News, not crybaby news: you don’t like the status quo, then get some friends, start making a better system, raise some money, then compete. If you think 30% is predatory, then make a system that only charges $what_you_think_is_fair. As far as Stripe, they take more than 3%. And for connect accounts, the percentage is closer to 3.5% not to mention you get charged $15 or $20 for a chargeback. What’s Apple charge developers for chargebacks? Zero. How often do developers have to challenge chargebacks with Apple? Zero. If you are selling using Stripe, it can become a significant expense, depending on your industry, especially gaming. It’s my feeling that people complaining about 30% have no idea of the expense of “doing it themselves.”
  - thoraway1010 6y ago
    Retail is crazy miserable for the person actually MAKING the product. Getting INTO stores is hard. The store can dump product back onto you - so they have no risk. The price on shelf has NOTHING to do with what you get, if you are small you are already going through some intermediaries. Ie, person making product, packing, shipping to distributor (some make you pay cost to get it to them), then distribution costs then retailer markups then return handling yadda yadda. THEN retailers will ask you to run promos and give them discounts or they will drop you. 3%? EVERYONE would pay that. In retail I'd say person making product gets maybe 20%? 80% is taken by others?

sukilot 6y ago

It's not the same at all. Payment processing is work, regardless of direction. Marketing fees for non-sales is payment for nothing.

andrewxdiamond 6y ago
....but Apple processes payments for App Store purchases? And they pay to maintain the store. Storage, bandwidth, updates, those are all “work” as well. I do think 30% is quite high, but this comment seems to consider Apple a charity house that should provide these services for free
- R0b0t1 6y ago
  Despite the fluid nature of consideration in contract law there are checks to ensure you can't demand $5000 for a single aspirin. That seems like it'd come into play here. The 30% only makes sense in the context of it paying for more than payment processing, and consequently if the marketing wasn't effective I'd not pay for it.
- latortuga 6y ago
  Don't forget that Apple takes a yearly developer license. You're claiming that the 30% cut that they keep on a refund is used to cover payment processing (typically priced around 3%) and the marginal cost of the bandwidth to distribute that single copy of the app? Even for $0.99 apps that price is outrageously expensive. AWS, notorious for their high bandwidth pricing, costs ~2 cents per GB on S3. This is 33 cents for a dozen MB. Nobody is saying Apple shouldn't get paid here, but keeping 30% is insane.
  - andrewxdiamond 6y ago
    A product or service is worth what people will pay, not what it costs.
- sushid 6y ago
  Why are there so many pro bono Apple defenders for this? They literally are taking 30% when a user buys an app and 30% when they are refunding it. 30% is quite high? It's highway robbery!