I have the programmer taking the times of the game and sending them to the website to be updated in the table. But, when I asked him to send the amount of money in the account up to the mobile devices they balked and said “it would require more sofsticated and complex work”. I had hoped this would be away to get around apple/google taking 30%. but, they are saying this would be a LOT more work. They offered to do a ticket system. but, I don’t want them to do a ticket per entry because user would have to go to the website each time they want to play. I said, ok ticket, but do it for the entire $10 but they didn’t like that idea because what if user uninstalls app. To me it is a simple select statement (yes, I understand you don’t want to use direct SQL) but why is such a simple thing like getting the balance from the account in the webserver to the device so hard??? They said it is hard because they have to worry about security. Can someone explain? or do you all know a way they don’t know? Thank you!
Can you provide a better description of what the app does, how money is being used? There really isn’t enough information in your post for anyone to advise you.
Rob
I don’t know why you need it. But, anyway. To play a certain game in the app, they need to pay $1. Of course, if we let iphone or Android take care of this then they get 30% of that $1. If we make them pay through website then they get nothing. I do have to pay 30cents plus 3%, so as long as they order $10 at a time I would save a lot of money. So, on website they pay $10. I need the app to know that it was funded. Of course, it has to be funded at the website. Then somehow let the app know that they have $10 credit. Then each time they play they take off $1. Thanks! Markis
Apple will not approve an app that unlocks game/app features that uses some outside payment method. The only thing that you can use external payments for is real-world goods. I’m pretty sure Google would have similar issues.
As far as your programmer balking, setting up IAP is more work than a simple REST network.request() call. But when you’re dealing with money things in scope change immensely. You have to collect credit cards and personal information. This has to be encrypted with a high-grade protection. You have to plan to be legally liable for any identity theft and credit card theft that comes your way. That alone is worth putting that burden on Apple and Google and is well worth the 30%.
The programmer would then have to also work with your payment processor to code the transactions to the credit card processing system. And having done this in a past life, I can tell you that it was a 3-4 month full time job to get all the code in place to process the credit card transactions. Today this process may be a bit more streamlined, but it’s still a lot of work.
How are you going to handle refunds? How are you going to collect the credit card information? You are basically asking your programmer to build your own In App Purchasing system which is way more work than passing data to a website.
Rob
Thank you very much for your answer.
I guess only exception would be Android (if you didn’t want them in the Android store) since you can allow people to download your application directly (I was told) so you can use paypal in your Android app and let people download directly from your website (I was told).
But, you did help me a lot. Thank you!
True, you can in some cases side-load apps on to Android devices. In some versions, the user has to turn on “Install apps from unknown stores” or something similar. You could set up your own store, though you would have to weigh out just how much traffic you’re going to get vs. hosting costs.
It also doesn’t change the fact that you would have to build your own In-App Purchasing system. PayPal is an option, but you have to be an Enterprise subscriber or a CoronaCards subscriber to be able to use the PayPal SDK. There was a 3rd party that had the PayPal plugin for sale, but that developer has gone out of business and the plugin is out of date, so that’s currently not an option.
Rob
Can you provide a better description of what the app does, how money is being used? There really isn’t enough information in your post for anyone to advise you.
Rob
I don’t know why you need it. But, anyway. To play a certain game in the app, they need to pay $1. Of course, if we let iphone or Android take care of this then they get 30% of that $1. If we make them pay through website then they get nothing. I do have to pay 30cents plus 3%, so as long as they order $10 at a time I would save a lot of money. So, on website they pay $10. I need the app to know that it was funded. Of course, it has to be funded at the website. Then somehow let the app know that they have $10 credit. Then each time they play they take off $1. Thanks! Markis
Apple will not approve an app that unlocks game/app features that uses some outside payment method. The only thing that you can use external payments for is real-world goods. I’m pretty sure Google would have similar issues.
As far as your programmer balking, setting up IAP is more work than a simple REST network.request() call. But when you’re dealing with money things in scope change immensely. You have to collect credit cards and personal information. This has to be encrypted with a high-grade protection. You have to plan to be legally liable for any identity theft and credit card theft that comes your way. That alone is worth putting that burden on Apple and Google and is well worth the 30%.
The programmer would then have to also work with your payment processor to code the transactions to the credit card processing system. And having done this in a past life, I can tell you that it was a 3-4 month full time job to get all the code in place to process the credit card transactions. Today this process may be a bit more streamlined, but it’s still a lot of work.
How are you going to handle refunds? How are you going to collect the credit card information? You are basically asking your programmer to build your own In App Purchasing system which is way more work than passing data to a website.
Rob
Thank you very much for your answer.
I guess only exception would be Android (if you didn’t want them in the Android store) since you can allow people to download your application directly (I was told) so you can use paypal in your Android app and let people download directly from your website (I was told).
But, you did help me a lot. Thank you!
True, you can in some cases side-load apps on to Android devices. In some versions, the user has to turn on “Install apps from unknown stores” or something similar. You could set up your own store, though you would have to weigh out just how much traffic you’re going to get vs. hosting costs.
It also doesn’t change the fact that you would have to build your own In-App Purchasing system. PayPal is an option, but you have to be an Enterprise subscriber or a CoronaCards subscriber to be able to use the PayPal SDK. There was a 3rd party that had the PayPal plugin for sale, but that developer has gone out of business and the plugin is out of date, so that’s currently not an option.
Rob