wroden

Q: "This app is no longer shared with you" message in Family Sharing

My daughter installed Minecraft PE through Family Sharing.  When she tries to open it, she gets a warning message "This app is no longer shared with you. To use it, you must buy it from the App Store."

 

When she views it in the app store, it tells her she can download it for free because a family member has already purchased it.  So she downloads it, and the cycle continues.

 

Any idea how to exit this loop?

iPhone 4S, iOS 8

Posted on Sep 18, 2014 4:19 PM

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Q: "This app is no longer shared with you" message in Family Sharing

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  • by Brian.Black,

    Brian.Black Brian.Black Oct 16, 2014 7:08 AM in response to Manny_man84
    Level 1 (4 points)
    iPhone
    Oct 16, 2014 7:08 AM in response to Manny_man84

    To my knowledge, I had not experienced any Family Sharing related issues since setting it up shortly after my wife and I installed iOS 8 a month ago. Just a few days ago in chasing down some free space, I reset both my iPhone and iPad back to factory defaults, then turned around and restored my encrypted iTunes backups to each of the devices. Everything was working fine, and I'd reclaimed some free space in the process.

     

    Today, there's an app that was previously purchased with my wife's AppleID that doesn't want to update through the App Store--in the Updates tab in App Store, it shows a Download button next to the app instead of the update button, and it never processes the download/update.

     

    So I deleted the app in question, then went to App Store > Purchased > Wife's purchases > re-downloaded the app, and am now getting the "This app is no longer shared with you" message upon launching it.

     

    Only troubleshooting steps I've tried thus far have been to sign out of App Store/iTunes on the device and then reboot, sign back in--to no avail.

  • by tomnorth,

    tomnorth tomnorth Oct 17, 2014 8:06 AM in response to wroden
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Oct 17, 2014 8:06 AM in response to wroden

    WWe are having the same issue. It appears that the affected apps are those recently updated. If you look at the Updates window I. The App Store you see that recently updated apps have a "Download" button to the right rather than "Open."  I tried re downloading the apps but I still got the same warning message about the app no longer being shared. For now I have turned off auto updating in my wife's iPad.

  • by Ariel.joy,

    Ariel.joy Ariel.joy Oct 18, 2014 3:11 PM in response to wroden
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 18, 2014 3:11 PM in response to wroden

    Same problem here Apple needs to fix this is I should not have to completely reset a device to get this to work. Some of us share devices

  • by ayang90,

    ayang90 ayang90 Oct 19, 2014 5:35 PM in response to wroden
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 19, 2014 5:35 PM in response to wroden

    After trying all the suggestions on this thread I finally gave up and went back to using my master ID on my daughters iPhone for iTunes purchases. It was just too frustrating trying to get all her apps to work with Family Sharing without losing her data.

     

    Apple has more work to do here before it's ready for prime time.

     

    Alan

  • by Richbdavis6,

    Richbdavis6 Richbdavis6 Oct 21, 2014 6:52 AM in response to wroden
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 21, 2014 6:52 AM in response to wroden

    Just downloaded 8.1 hoping it would fix this issue, but it doesn't.

    Question to Apple. When are you going to fix this? When downloading a free app that is registered already in the family, there needs to be an option to say "install my own version". Rather than the current choice of futilely downloading the family option and generating the error again or cancelling the install completely.

  • by phantom5251,

    phantom5251 phantom5251 Oct 23, 2014 10:07 AM in response to wroden
    Level 1 (4 points)
    iCloud
    Oct 23, 2014 10:07 AM in response to wroden

    Has anyone been able to solve this problem?  I'm the family organizer, and am trying to share apps with my wife, but getting the same message as everyone else.  Tried signing and out of App Store on my phone, had her do the same on hers, tried resetting all settings on my phone, nothing.  Do we need to reset all settings on hers? 

  • by cerulean~blue,

    cerulean~blue cerulean~blue Oct 23, 2014 11:36 AM in response to phantom5251
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 23, 2014 11:36 AM in response to phantom5251

    Yes, the issue was resolved for me by creating a backup in iTunes, restoring the device having the issue in iTunes and then setting it up from backup.

  • by t-barker,

    t-barker t-barker Oct 26, 2014 10:47 AM in response to wroden
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 26, 2014 10:47 AM in response to wroden

    I too was experiencing this silly bug, and believe I found a resolution that doesn't require a full backup/restore of the device.

     

    My situation:

    1. Got my wife a new iPad
    2. Daughter got my wife's old iPad
    3. Daughter's iPad was restored from backup
    4. Set up Family Sharing on my Wife's iPad, making her the primary Family Share user.
    5. Added my Daughter to the Family Group
    6. The "Find my Phone" app (and about 10 others) were stuck in the weird state where the app would not open or install.

     

    What I did to finally resolve it:

    1. On my daughter's iPad, went to iTunes & App Store in Settings and logged out of my Daughter's Apple ID.
    2. Entered my wife's Apple ID instead, and logged on as her.
    3. Opened the App Store, and went to "Updates" and this time it showed the little cloud icon and let me download the update.
    4. Opened the updated app, and it worked fine.  So I updated one additional app as well, and it too opened fine after it was updated.
    5. Went back into iTunes & App Store in Settings and logged out of my Wife's Apple ID.
    6. Logged back in with my Daughter's Apple ID.
    7. Double-pressed the home button and closed all open apps
    8. Opened the App Store, and went to "Updates" and updated one app.  After it updated, all of the "Download" buttons turned to "Open" buttons showing that all apps were effectively already updated and installed.

     

    Everything has been working okay since doing this, and hope it continues that way.

     

    Hopefully this will benefit someone else and help you avoid having to do a full backup/restore of the device.

  • by enteq,

    enteq enteq Oct 28, 2014 4:33 PM in response to wroden
    Level 1 (17 points)
    Oct 28, 2014 4:33 PM in response to wroden

    I was having the same issue; it affected 7 apps.

     

    I tried all the following with no success. (When I say I "re-purchased" that means I got the message that another family member already bought the app and I can download it for free, then it downloaded - but I still got the error.) This is what I tried:

    • re-purchased one of the affected apps in the App Store with the device user's Apple ID (not the Apple ID who originally purchased the app)
    • deleting the app and then re-purchasing
    • rebooting the iPad
    • signing out of the App Store, and then signing back in with the same (i.e. the device user's) Apple ID
    • deleting the affected apps, then signing out of the App Store, then restarting the iPad, then signing into the App Store (again with the device user's Apple ID), then repurchasing the apps with the same Apple ID.

     

    Despite trying all these steps, I still got the "This app is no longer shared with you" message with all the affected apps.

     

    Finally I was able to resolve the issue as follows:

    • delete all the affected apps
    • backup the iPad to iCloud
    • completely wipe the iPad (using General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings)
    • restore using the most recent iCloud backup
    • re-purchase the affected apps in the App Store using the device user's Apple ID

     

    This time, after getting the message that another family member already bought the app and I can download it for free, the apps finally worked as normal.

     

    So, restore from iCloud backup solved the issue, which means that if you happen to only be using iCloud backup already, then it's not necessary to mess around with iTunes to solve this issue.

     

    Frustratingly it took many hours of work to get this far.

     

    I'd like to mention that, contrary to what some others have been saying:

    • the affected apps were not all free; it was a mixture of paid and free apps
    • the affected apps were not ones that state Family Sharing is not supported in the App Store - e.g. Google Chrome was affected and that quite clearly says Family Sharing is supported
    • the affected apps were not ones that had recently been updated - at least, not according to the App Store's update log

     

    Also, it may not have been spelled out, that what's particularly annoying about this issue is that you can't even ignore Family Sharing and download the app again with the device user's Apple ID - especially for apps that are free anyway. In other words, it's not just that Family Sharing doesn't work, it's that Family Sharing is preventing you from doing something that you could have done without / before Family Sharing.

     

    Finally, one piece of unexpected behaviour is that during the restore process, I was prompted for the password of a really old, defunct Apple ID I haven't used in years, which is not part of Family Sharing at all. Does it mean one of the apps on the device was purchased with this old Apple ID? I could have sworn I purchased all the apps with my new Apple ID. How can I find out which Apple ID was used to purchase each app? There are instructions for this on the web, but they all involve using iTunes - but I don't sync with iTunes, I use iCloud instead. Is there any way to find the offending app(s) within iOS?

  • by ofnaughc,

    ofnaughc ofnaughc Oct 30, 2014 3:20 AM in response to t-barker
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 30, 2014 3:20 AM in response to t-barker

    t-barker's solution worked for me. The trick seems to be related to using the original purchaser. My whole family is on the sharing system. The situation I have:

    • An organizing Apple ID that has not purchased anything yet.
    • My Apple ID that has purchased most things on our devices
    • My wife's Apple ID that has purchased something only on her device
    • My daughter's newly minted family-sharing only Apple ID

     

    My wife's device started throwing the "app no longer shared" on apps purchased under my Apple ID (both free and $$$). It only affected apps once they had been updated after joining family sharing.

     

    1. Close all background apps
    2. Log out of Itunes & App Store under Settings
    3. Log in with Apple ID that originally purchased apps
    4. Launch App Store and "Update All", or click individual apps "Update"
    5. For any apps not showing "Open" next to them, click on the individual app's "Cloud" download symbol.
    6. If nothing is shown next to the app, click on the app listing itself (go to the app's details page). A "Cloud" symbol should be there.
    7. After all apps were downloaded, launch to ensure they work.
    8. Log out of Itunes & App Store
    9. Log in with original Apple ID

     

    No restarting, settings wipe, app deleting, or restoring was done. Before I tried this trick, I had restarted the phone a couple times, but still got the error message. It was only when processing updates with purchasing Apple ID logged into the Itunes & App store that things were fixed. I speculate that apps (purchased by someone other than the device's user) updated for the first time after joining family sharing will exhibit this problem. I'll probably have to do this many more times as more updates for the other apps that I have bought come out (or Apple fixes this crap).

  • by Blessedj01,

    Blessedj01 Blessedj01 Oct 30, 2014 3:29 AM in response to wroden
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 30, 2014 3:29 AM in response to wroden

    This happens due to a glitch with Family sharing. You have to get the other Family member to update the app, then delete the app on your device and re-download it.

  • by redmamoth,

    redmamoth redmamoth Oct 31, 2014 12:55 AM in response to Blessedj01
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 31, 2014 12:55 AM in response to Blessedj01

    Same problem here, I also have problems getting Facetime to work, it just hangs on connecting...  but there's another thread for that.  I think it's safe to say Apple has lost it's "just works" mantra.

  • by enteq,

    enteq enteq Oct 31, 2014 1:40 AM in response to ofnaughc
    Level 1 (17 points)
    Oct 31, 2014 1:40 AM in response to ofnaughc

    OK, the reason I didn't enter the Apple ID password of the user who originally purchased the apps is because I thought it might not be a permanent solution, and I might get prompted for that ID every time those apps update.

     

    It's not clear to me whether this will be the case or not. But then again, it's not clear whether the wipe and restore solution is permanent either - having wiped and restored, I may also find the problem comes back and/or I'm prompted for the original purchaser's Apple ID when apps need to update as well.

     

    But my reasoning was, the whole idea of Family Sharing is that each device owner only needs to use their own Apple ID, so I didn't want to start entering other users' Apple ID's as part of a solution or workaround.

     

    Lets see what happens when the next app updates arrive. Hopefully the issue will be fixed soon anyway.

  • by ayang90,

    ayang90 ayang90 Oct 31, 2014 6:04 PM in response to t-barker
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 31, 2014 6:04 PM in response to t-barker

    So t-barker's solution worked of me. Thanks so much for the post.

     

    However, it seems the essence of the work around is to have the app be updated with the original purchaser ID rather than the new family member. Kind of defeats the whole idea of family share. What a pain in the neck.


    Apple needs to get the authorization model right. I can't believe this was launched with defects such as this.

  • by Glenn300Z,

    Glenn300Z Glenn300Z Nov 2, 2014 12:49 PM in response to wroden
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 2, 2014 12:49 PM in response to wroden

    I found that deleting the app that causes the message and then using iTunes to re-install.  It appears this may be caused when "family organizer" apple-id had downloaded the app and the family member apple-id had downloaded also.

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