Apple still hasn't made Dutch App Store changes despite $28M in fines

Apple has yet to implement — or even respond to — App Store feedback from Dutch regulators despite the country's antitrust watchdog levying a $5.7 million fine for the fifth consecutive week.

On Monday, the Authority for Consumers and Markets again fined Apple 5 million euros for refusing to change its in-app subscription policy to allow outside payment methods. The ACM has been levying weekly fines since Apple missed a Jan. 15 deadline to make the changes.

Reuters reported on Monday that Apple has not made any new proposal to comply with the Dutch ruling.

"We have clearly explained to Apple how they can comply...," ACM said in a statement. "So far, however, they have refused to put forward any serious proposals."

Apple also did not respond to a request for comment from Reuters.

Back in December 2021, Dutch regulators ruled that Apple broke competition law and must make changes to its App Store policy, including allowing the use of non-Apple payment methods by software makers in the Netherlands.

Apple claims it is already in compliance with the Dutch regulations because it now allows dating apps in the country to use third-party payment methods if they are resubmitted to the App Store.

However, Apple said it still intends to charge a 27% commission on in-app purchases using third-party payment methods — only slightly lower than the company's standard 30% cut. The Dutch regulator rejected Apple's moves, claiming that it still places an unreasonable burden on developers and does not mark compliance.

Dutch regulators can fine Apple a maximum of 50 million euros for the noncompliance. As of Monday, the Cupertino tech giant has been fined 25 million euros.

23 Comments

DAalseth 3029 comments · 6 Years

About 2 years ago

Maybe Apple has decided that €50 million is just the cost of doing business.

pizzaboxmac 34 comments · 4 Years

DAalseth said:

Maybe Apple has decided that €50 million is just the cost of doing business.

I agree. They seem to have had enough of being bullied.

foregoneconclusion 2834 comments · 12 Years

The ACM has never provided an explanation as to why they believe an additional SKU that supports 3rd party payments rises to the level of "unreasonable". Consumers have to choose between multiple SKUs on a regular basis in both hardware and software.

techconc 275 comments · 7 Years

DAalseth said:

Maybe Apple has decided that €50 million is just the cost of doing business.

Yeah, just to do a little perspective on this. Using the back of the napkin math... Apple made $34.6 Billion USD profit last quarter. Convert to Euros, that's 30.6+ Billion Euros. Divide by 90 (days in the quarter) and that's 340+ million Euros profit per day or roughly 14+ million Euros per hour they make in profit. So, the maximum fine represents the profit Apple makes in about 3 hours. I suspect they can't be bothered by such nonsense.

kempathonnodge 20 comments · 3 Years

€50m is Much cheaper than the cost of setting a precedent of allow third party payments. They have complied with the letter of the law… It’ll be interesting to see if they ever hand over the money.