Apple is known for imposing strict rules on app developers. These rules may sound harsh at first, but they translate easily for customers. Apple’s new app for app developers aims to bring more clarity about what happens to user accounts after they are closed or deleted.
Under its new Account Deletion Act, Apple requires applications that allow you to create an account and allow you to delete it because closing your account is unreasonable.
In a post on its developer support website, Apple reminded app developers that they would need to give users the opportunity to start deleting their account from apps posted on the App Store from June 30.
The initial guidelines were supposed to take effect. in January earlier this year but Apple had to postpone the deadline to June. Now, with just over a month to go, Apple wants developers to speed up the process to avoid any action.
According to Apple’s terms, deleting an account means not only deleting a profile but also any data associated with the account “which is not legally required by the developer to maintain.”
That includes social media apps, as well as forums for sharing content, and any posts, photos, videos, or updates posted by users.
This is the responsibility of the developers who will provide the space to create an account in their App Store applications, and “granting a temporary shutdown or account closure is not enough.”
Apple said that if account deletion is delayed, the developer should notify his users of the same. If the app allows action, developers should tell users how the billing and cancellation will be handled.
For subscriptions, developers also need to tell users that they will need to visit the subscription menu on their Apple ID page to cancel recurring subscriptions.
Apps that require “additional customer service flow to verify and direct the account removal process” will need to be highly industry-leading, as described in the App Store Update Guidelines.
If the application does not belong to that category, requesting users to call or send a cancellation email should not be required.
For applications that require some form of user authentication in order to be canceled, Apple says developers may add proprietary verification measures, but adding unnecessary steps will make their applications less likely to pass the update.
In other words, Apple will not please any engineer if it asks users to perform unnecessary cancellation actions, which may confuse them so that they do not proceed with the cancellation process.
Those applications that connect to the web browser through the sign-in process or account registration will also need to provide account deletion within the app. Not doing so, says Apple, “is not right.”
If the application automatically creates an account, it will also be required to include the option for users to start account deletion.
Apple has set out several guidelines for the new Account Clearance Act to help developers comply with the deadline, but while that may be stressful, customers will find better information.
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