I moved country, changed iTunes stores and now my Apps can't be updated!?

You can definitely set up a secondary Apple ID, and you can also have apps from both of these IDs run simultaneously on a single device. However, you can only update the apps from your secondary account on your computers. And, yes, you'll have to keep on signing in and out on both accounts to update your apps.

It's not a huge problem, but:

1. I don't want to manage TWO accounts
2. It's a bit of a pain in the neck to sign in and out from two accounts, especially over a slow internet connection. I'd much prefer to have all my apps on one ID.

Anyone made substantive progress in solving the "changing app store country" problem?

Hi Bowgart,

Having received a direct response from Apple on this, I can tell you that there is no solution to this. I'm skeptical about everything I purchase on the AppStore now, and at the back of my mind, I wonder what will happen if and when I move countries the next time.

The only solution (or rather a work-around) is to keep your credit card active even after you leave a country (if at all thats possible).

I am moving to a different country in a few weeks and I really want to have the "update" option for my apps working properly. So I guess that the only option is to open a new account in the new country and re-buy all the apps, right?

I haven't spent that much money in my current account so I probably will do that. My question is if I can open the new Apple ID using the email I used to open the first account. I changed the email from the first account to a different one but when I try to open the new account it sais that that email has already been verified to be used in other Apple ID.

Is there any way of "freeing" the email from the previous account? or even delete the first account completely so I can use the email to create a new one?

Thanks!

Guys,

All you need to do is fight with apple for change this policy than they might look into changing it otherwise no reason to recover the purchased apps

Hi Zephyrus,

If you've made up your mind to re-purchase apps in the new country store, why dont you just use the CHANGE COUNTRY option and put in the new country credit card details?

That way, you dont need to bother about opening a second account and substituing email addresses.

Or have I understood your question?

Hi Nivas37,

I read most of the post of the discussion and I understood that when you change the country within your current account you won't get updates notifications for the apps that were puschased in the store of the previous country (even if you re-download them from the store in the new country). I am not happy about having to pay again for something I already paid for, but I really want the get the update notifications service working properly.

I know you can re-download (and update) manually the apps you bought if they are available in the store of the new country, but having to check each app for updates individually is a pain in the neck.

Apple is definitely not giving a good solution for this...

So...I decided to open a new account in the new coutry and re-buy (happy days for apple) a few paid apps that I really like/use. But I really would like to use my actual email for the new account. I changed the email in the "old" account to a secundary email so I could use my primary email to open the new account, but I get the message "this email has already been verified for other Apple ID..."

Any solution to this?

I put my itunes librery on the user folder so it can be read by any signing account and open sesion with the itunes from different contries on different users; I made certain that all itunes from every user have their librery directed to the same itunes librery and it worked! so far; I hope future upgrades allow you to purchase from different contries because some of us are moving all the time!

Really interesting. So I understand this to mean:

1) You moved the itunes library into the [HardDiskName]/Users folder.

2) You created multiple user accounts, [HardDiskName]/Users/JoeUser and [HardDiskName]/Users/BettyUser etc.

3) You opened JoeUser's iTunes holding down the option key, then chose the main library stored in [HardDiskName]/Users. You did the same for other user accounts.

4) You chose one country for JoeUser. When you wanted to access iTunes in another country, you opened BettyUser's iTunes account with the other country chosen.

The result was that each iTunes account recognized its country, downloaded its updates correctly, etc., but all the apps and songs were stored in just one library.

My question is: did you do this with multiple iTunes accounts, i.e. an Apple account in one country with one Apple ID, email, credit card, etc. and another Apple account in a second country with a different Apple ID, email, credit card, etc.?

Or were you able to do it with just one Apple account?

Yes!. Each country has a different account different email and different paying instructions (I do not use credit cards in all of them I buy the iTunes gift cards and redeem them so I have money available in all of them! It works so far very well! I can read books that I bought in the Spanish account and apps that I bought in the USA on my phone or my iPad at the same time without a problem.

How long have you been doing this? It does sound like a pretty foolproof system. And I guess you could jump back and forth easily with Fast User Switching turned on.

Does each account update its apps correctly?

Acouple of Months, and it is still working

Yes you switch back and forth using the upper right hand corner user switcher!

I have updated apps on my iphone and ipad and the syncronized them with itunes. All apps up to date now.

Everyone, I'm encountering a new wrinkle to this discussion that I haven't seen discussed.

I have been using the same AppleID since 2004, and it was opened in the US where I have mostly resided. I am an expat and during that time have lived in two different countries for extended periods of time: Russia for 3 years and now Norway. During this entire time, I have maintained a US address (my parents) and US credit cards and banks. This has enabled me to buy all iTunes content from the US store regardless of where I have lived around the world.

Yesterday, this came to an abrupt end when I was asked to contact customer service due to a payment issue.

It turns out that they have finally cracked down in the past couple of weeks (according to the rep I chatted with) and have updated their system to prevent purchases outside of the country in which your account was set up. This is in line with how Netflix, Hulu and Amazon's video on demand services work. People who have tried to circumvent this through VPN's have many times had their account disabled permanently due to violation of terms of service, so I'm not willing to play THAT game. All of my purchases made under the iTunes store can continue to be re-downloaded (both Music, Movies, Apps and TV Shows) and I can stream them to my heart's content via AppleTV. I just cannot buy NEW content using the US store unless I am physically in the US (i.e. on business trips or vacations).

If I change stores, but keep the Apple ID the same, I will have to bounce back and forth in order to regain access to earlier content. Since I know I will someday be back in the US after several years, it is worth it to me to keep my US account in good order. However, I will know have now passed a "fork in the road" where all content I buy will be split: Norway and US. And let me tell you--the Norway store is pretty lacking.

Ouch... that's awful, MSchutz. =( Sorry to hear it. I wonder if we'll start hearing about lots of similar cases soon, then...