The Reserve Bank of India is set to make sweeping changes to the way certain transactions are made by banking users in the country. The changes will come in effect from October 1 and ahead of it, Apple has issued an advisory to developers who create apps for the Apple ecosystem.
In a post on the Apple developer website, the company wrote, “Starting in October 2021, regulatory requirements in India will apply to the processing of recurring transactions. The Reserve Bank of India has issued a directive that will affect purchases in India initiated via credit cards and debit cards for auto-renewable subscriptions,” said Apple.
As per the RBI directive, banks, financial institutions, and gateways will be required to obtain user approval by conducting transaction notifications, e-mandates, and Additional Factors of Authentication (AFA) before the transaction can be completed.
If developers offer auto-renewable subscriptions in their app, then Apple wants them to do two things to help prevent or resolve declined transactions on the App Store.
Encouraging users to pay with Apple ID
If you pay with your Apple ID balance then they will not be impacted by these requirements at this time. Users can add funds to their Apple ID using most credit and debit cards, Net Banking, RuPay, and UPI. Apple wants developers to encourage users to pay for in-app subscriptions with Apple ID.
Giving users a billing grace period
Apple says on the developer website, “Enable Billing Grace Period in App Store Connect so subscribers with declined transactions or other payment issues have time to update their payment information while retaining access to your app’s paid content.” If there’s a grace period, then there won’t be any interruption to the subscription’s days of paid service and the app developers’ revenue won’t be impacted if payment is successful within the grace period.
