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Apple Offers Refund After British Boy Spends $2500 on In-App Purchases in 15 Minutes

All the "bad parents" and "bad society" comments are ridiculous. Reminds me of the 90s when children were starting to use the internet for the first time and making purchases, and people were crying about the same the same things. The sky isn't falling...these are rare instances that are often easily corrected.
 
jamojamo said:
When I see these things I think of the sad fact that while we have Parental Control settings on devices, many of these Parents have no desire to exercise any real Control and just want to keep the peace vs. the hard job of parenting.
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well... ya.

we have these systems in place, just people don't wanna use them, one reason or another. But then again, forcing this onto user isn't the answer....

Parental Controls is a good start, but its like anything else, if it gets in the way, we'll just turn if off. Anything though, is better than nothing at all

But, a much more effective route is "Just don't refund money....." That will teach everyone before thinking twice.

Come on Apple, tighten ya grip..
 
As a parent, it is hard to judge another parent. Daddy could have been home alone and needed to take a crap for all I know (didn't read completely, so it might be mentioned)...

15 minutes is a short time and kids can do a lot of damage...

That said, knowing how it works, I would probably have allowe the download, then signed off my iTunes account and then give the iPad to my son. Not everyone has in depth knowledge of how iOS works.

I think Apple showed good faith, although they didn't have too. I personally would like to see a check box to indicate I want the account unlocked for a short time after entering my password.

With an iPhone, you could buy an app, then forget your phone somewhere, so this could still happen without getting "bad parenting" comments.
 
I played with LEGO when I was 5...together with my parents...strange new world where parents just give their children iPads and say: "Play with that, but don't disturb us..."
 
After seeing how 5 year olds use iPads, I would never let my 5 year old touch my iPad.
 
The Bulge said:
In-app purchases are the one single worst thing to happen to iOS. That's why we have those ****ing freemium games and apps. Jesus ...
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The whole idea of in-app purchases is how Apple and the like managed to make game devs (and app devs in general afterwards) jump head first in their ecosystem.

For or against user interest isn't the point, it's a business model and it has worked spectacularly well so far.
 
yousifabdullah said:
It's really cool that Apple refunded everything, but this also highlights the problem that parents should oversee what their children are doing and that both the parents and the child understand what is going on. A good parent wouldn't give an iPad to a 5-year-old logged into an iTunes account with billing information. :/
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Good parenting is hard o find these days.
 
My nephew did something similar with Tap Tap Resort (or whatever that game was called). Granted he only spent $99, but my sister contacted Apple and she received a refund.

Not sure why this is a news article since it's common.
 
That refund should be accompanied by a rattan cane and instructions for its proper use on that kid.

Our five year old is allowed to use some of our electronic toys with our supervision (basically, sitting next to him). Turning any kid loose with all manner of accounts and credit is just stupid, but we are teaching our kid to ask permission when he seed a box asking a question and we are supervising his access. In other words, we're doing our jobs.
 
WHat about an auto-lock out on the App Store ?

If excessive purchase are made over a short period of time, it lock your account, till you phone Apple directly as the account holder ?

Not a sure fire approach, but at least the cost would be much less.
 
Why all the fuss on parent's not being responsible for parental controls? The five year old probably didn't know how to count currency and the parents most likely didn't know how to activate the parental controls or know a lot about in app purchases. My parents have iPhones and they don't even know how to update their apps in the App Store. I always have to update them when I get home.
 
johncrab said:
That refund should be accompanied by a rattan cane and instructions for its proper use on that kid.
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That's actually a horrible thing to even joke about. And about a 5 year old. Distasteful.

It's so easy for so many people here to judge on parenting without considering for a second that this isn't even about parenting or at least very well might not be.

As I wrote earlier - most people here know the ins and outs of iOS and about parental controls. Not everyone explores all the settings and features on their phone/iPad. Should they - you can argue either way. But then you could also argue that things like this should default to OFF not ON - making the choice pro-active.
 
Rudy69 said:
We need people to start owning up for their own mistakes. The password was put in by an adult, he's responsible for that purchase.
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What if it were $1,000,000? Would you hold him responsible and sell him into bondage to pay it off?

Negating accidental purchases is good customer service.
 
Was looking forward to buy Real Racing 3 for quite some time - quite disappointed about their decision.
 
Pman17 said:
Why all the fuss on parent's not being responsible for parental controls? The five year old probably didn't know how to count currency and the parents most likely didn't know how to activate the parental controls or know a lot about in app purchases. My parents have iPhones and they don't even know how to update their apps in the App Store. I always have to update them when I get home.
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This. Exactly my point. Not everyone knows every function or setting on their phone.
 
How this is apple's fault in any way is beyond me. First of all they have included a toggle to turn off in-app purchases - use it. Secondly they would be well within their rights not to include this toggle. They can make their products how they want and if you don't like it, don't buy it! If you still want the product maybe you should take more care about letting your child use it! would you give your child your credit/debit card and PIN when they asked to play with the ATM? I hope not!

Anyway I'm feeling rather too preachy so I'll end my rant by saying this: Climbing costs his parents nothing? That climbing frame looks pretty damn expensive to me ;)
 
Parents could have taken 5 minutes to familiarize themselves with parental controls on the ipad. Once again dumb parents need to blame someone else.
 
applesith said:
Parents could have taken 5 minutes to familiarize themselves with parental controls on the ipad. Once again dumb parents need to blame someone else.
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How do you know they knew parental controls even existed? Why are the settings defaulting to on and not off. Why does it make sense to be passive as opposed to proactive to turn them on?
 
Lots of Personal Responsibility Badasses in here. And here I thought I was one of them!

If you build a system where it's ridiculously easy to accidentally buy extremely expensive virtual goods, you should also have a reasonable system in place to allow people to reverse those mistakes.

It's not like the kid came home with a new car or a yacht. You can't commit yourself to purchasing something like that with an errant swipe of the finger.

Never before in human history have we had a situation where a person could say "Oops! I just spent $2,500 on accident, now we can't make the mortgage payment". Suddenly this possibility has been sprung upon us, blindsiding many, and the Macrumors zeitgeist is "Make the bastards pay!"
 
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Tech198 said:
WHat about an auto-lock out on the App Store ?

If excessive purchase are made over a short period of time, it lock your account, till you phone Apple directly as the account holder ?
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Why not just turn on password required for every purchase, it's already there.
 
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