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Developers Now Able to Submit Claims for $250 to $30,000 Payments From Apple in Lawsuit Settlement

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Apple in August announced plans to pay $100 million to settle a class-action lawsuit levied by U.S. developers, and as of today, the website that will allow developers to submit a claim for a payout has gone live.

iOS-App-Store-General-Feature-JoeBlue.jpg

The $100 million that Apple provided is being distributed as part of a "Small Developer Assistance Fund," and developers can claim between $250 and $30,000 based on their historic App Store participation. Claims can now be submitted using the Small Developer Assistance website, which also has tools for estimating payments.

Eligible U.S. developers must meet the following criteria for apps:
  • Was sold for a non-zero price;
  • Was sold via Apple's iOS App Store between 2015 and 2021; and
  • Earned, together with any other iOS applications or in-app products (including subscriptions) sold through all of your associated developer accounts, proceeds equal to or less than $1,000,000.00 through the App Store U.S. storefront in every calendar year from 2015 to 2021 in which you had a developer account.
According to the settlement, there are approximately 67,000 eligible developers. Developers who earned less than $100 will get a potential minimum payment of $250, while those who earned over $1,000,000 will be entitled to the $30,000 payment. Minimum payments are subjected to change based on the total number of claims.

The lawsuit dates back to 2019, when a group of iOS developers accused Apple of using its ‌App Store‌ monopoly to impose "profit-killing" commissions. The lawsuit took issue with Apple's 30 percent cut of ‌App Store‌ sales, and was largely addressed with the late 2020 announcement of the App Store Small Business Program that cut the commission that small developers have to pay to 15 percent.

Along with the $100 million payment to developers, Apple also agreed to some other concessions. Perhaps the biggest concession will see Apple allowing developers to use communications like email to share information about payment methods available outside of iOS apps. Developers will not pay Apple a commission on purchases that take place outside of the App Store.

Apple is also expanding the number of price points available to developers for subscriptions, and the company has agreed to maintain the App Store Small Business Program and App Store search, making no changes for at least three years. Apple also promised to continue to offer developers the option to appeal an app rejection, and it will create an annual transparency report based on App Store data covering app rejections, apps removed from the App Store, search information, and more.

Developers need to submit claims by May 20, 2022 to get a payment from Apple, and there will be a final approval hearing on June 7, 2022. The actual payout date will vary based on whether there are objections, how long it takes to resolve those objections, and whether the agreement receives final approval from the court.

(Thanks, Christophe!)

Article Link: Developers Now Able to Submit Claims for $250 to $30,000 Payments From Apple in Lawsuit Settlement
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2022/01/14/developers-app-store-lawsuit-claim-submissions/
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MacRumors said:
The $100 million that Apple provided is being distributed as part of a "Small Developer Assistance Fund," and developers can claim between $250 and $30,000 based on their historic App Store participation.
Click to expand...
Between $250 and $30,000... I wonder if this will be like how a lot of class action payouts are in the form of a voucher/credit that you have to use with the defendant instead of an actual check you can cash/deposit.

$30,000 in Apple Store credit... that'd be pretty terrible.
 
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Betcha the plantiffs' lawyers are grabbing the majority of the settlement $$$, as is sadly the case in just about every class action suit.
 
sw1tcher said:
Between $250 and $30,000... I wonder if this will be like how a lot of class action payouts are in the form of a voucher/credit that you have to use with the defendant instead of an actual check you can cash/deposit.

$30,000 in Apple Store credit... that'd be pretty terrible.
Click to expand...

No, it's a direct deposit of cash or a check.
 
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Fix your wording. "Sold apps in the U.S. storefront" was never mentioned in the original page. Instead, it says "US developer".

Your article is hugely misleading. I don't even understand why you'd paraphrase the wording in the original page anyways...
 
sw1tcher said:
Between $250 and $30,000... I wonder if this will be like how a lot of class action payouts are in the form of a voucher/credit that you have to use with the defendant instead of an actual check you can cash/deposit.

$30,000 in Apple Store credit... that'd be pretty terrible.
Click to expand...
Yeah, that's like 3 MBP M1s, a couple of M1 iPads, and ten headphones or earbuds, right? Or 50 GB of iCloud storage for 28,000 years! Hey, maybe now we're talking!
 
tengl said:
Fix your wording. "Sold apps in the U.S. storefront" was never mentioned in the original page. Instead, it says "US developer".

Your article is hugely misleading. I don't even understand why you'd paraphrase the wording in the original page anyways...
Click to expand...

I could be misinterpreting it, but it says proceeds through the App Store U.S. storefront. I'll take that bit out though so it's not misleading, and developers can get more info from the site.

"Earned, together with any other iOS applications or in-app products (including subscriptions) sold through all of your associated developer accounts, proceeds equal to or less than $1,000,000.00 through the App Store U.S. storefront in every calendar year from 2015 to 2021 in which you had a developer account."

Edit: Added the specific wording from the website so there is no confusion.
 
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I guess I’m getting some free cash maybe? Deal.

Just for reference but it looks like I landed in the 50-100k bracket for those years and the payout is $3500 if that really happens.
 
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I'm pretty sure I'll file a claim. For the bracket I'm in, too good to pass up. And while it's not an answer to the following, I'm still annoyed at Apple for the following:

A few times, educators purchased bulk quantities of my app (50% off the $1.99 app, so 99 cents each). I found that the following year, my sales records were showing a large amount of returns. I then found these returns were for sales the prior year (at least six months ago at the time). No amount of emails to Apple resolved this. I found it extremly unfair that people could get full refunds far beyond the 45 day return period. Especially so when so far in to the future. I had already claimed that income and paid taxes on it. In total, lost a couple hundred on these sales.

Still, the store has been a great place for me. Ever since the electronic delivery of software, no need to compete for physical store shelf space.

Finally, while there are deadlines to file and the court date set, the FAQ doesn't call out any firm payout dates. Seems there could be appeals, etc. that could delay that.
 
Couple of things to note:

- Payouts are based on PROCEEDS total, not SALES total.

- Payouts are based on USA proceeds only, not WORLDWIDE proceeds.

- Payouts are based only between the times of June 4, 2015 - Dec 31, 2020.

So your payouts might be significantly smaller when factoring these things in. What I thought would have been a minimum $20k payout for me is now a minimum $10k payout with these things factored in.

One bonus is that these are MINIMUM payouts:

- "Importantly, the minimum payment amounts set forth above are just that, minimums. They would apply only if every member of the Settlement Class submits an approved claim. While the Parties have developed a robust and streamlined claims process, see infra at Section II.B.3, a 100 percent claims rate is not likely. The proposed Settlement Administrator, Angeion Group LLC (“Angeion”), estimates a claims rate of 35 percent in this matter." ...... "The minimum payment amounts set forth in Section 6.2 above assume that one hundred percent (100%) of Settlement Class Members have an Approved Claim. If not all Settlement Class Members have an Approved Claim, then the minimum payment amounts to Settlement Class Members with Approved Claims shall increase proportionally in correspondence with the same categories of Developer Proceeds as
contained in Section 6.2."

Basically this means that there is a chance for a 2x-3x increase in your total claim size.
 
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If Tim didn't keep the Apple Board in the loop about what he, Phil, & Matt, have been up to, Tim will be forced out by end-of-June !
 
They’re just giving back what they shouldn’t have taken in the first place. $100 million is a drop in the bucket of the untold billions the App Store has made.
 
The lawsuit is ridiculous. If seller agree with 30 percent commission, it is business contract. Moreover Apple cannot be monopoly of their own product otherwise every company is monopoly of their products, and monopoly become meaningless. Again, apple’s market share is far from monopoly of entire smart phone market. What’s the point of the lawsuit?
 
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