"Your credit card is about to expire" error every time I try to purchase an app in App Store

I’ve had this problem too - started to get emails in the middle of December saying that upcoming subscriptions were going to fail and I should update my payment details - but everything was correct so there was nothing to update. Then yesterday my iTunes Match did indeed fail to renew because the payment failed.

Contacted Apple Support and was fortunate enough to speak to someone who was aware of the cause of this problem. As I understand it, this is an Apple Pay issue where a person’s credit card is linked to Apple Pay. Believe it or not, Apple Pay is not using the credit card expiry date but has a blanket expiry date of December 2023, which is why payments are starting to fail for lots of people.

To fix it, I was told to do the following. Go to Settings->Apple Id->Payment and Shipping and remove the payment method linked to Apple Pay. Then add the card details back as a new payment method but DO NOT LINK it to Apple Pay. The card should then start working again.

I won’t get into the craziness of this or the fact that Apple appear to have sat on this problem since mid-December when they started sending out emails saying upcoming payments were going to fail…..

Hi all, just got it working again.

I only have one card on file for Apple and couldn’t delete or modify it because of an active subscription. I had to add a PayPal account to my payments, delete the “expiring” card, re-add the “expiring” card and remove the PayPal account. Just tested it out and it works.

I fixed my problem with payments, in a text conversation with Apple here is what we found:

• on my iPhone 12, running 17.2.1.
• I went to: Settings/AppleID/Account Settings/Purchase History
• We found an "unpaid" purchase (my was to an app)...I selected that "unpaid" purchase
• It said that it was "unpaid" because my credit card had expired (which we all know it wasn't)...but then asked if I wanted to "relink" or "link" (I don't recall the exact wording) the credit card payment method in my AppleID to my Apple Wallet. I selected "yes"....and it "relinked" to my Wallet. All of the red text turned to black.
• I agreed to pay the "unpaid" purchase and....presto! Everything worked again.
• The Apple person I was texting seemed to understand that the "expiring credit card" was a bogus error message; the cause of the problems was this "unpaid" purchase.
• I have no idea why the purchase was "unpaid"...not sure what went wrong the first time. It was a valid purchase request, so nothing funny going on here.

I hope that works for others.

The solution that worked for me was the suggestion Picanmix suggested below....with a caveat. If you have one card in your payment method and have ongoing subscriptions, you can't delete or edit the card until you add second different credit card or debit card to your payment method to fix the problem. It will not allow you to either edit or remove your one payment method if you have ongoing subcriptions.

So, you need to add a new second card which becomes your default card and the problem should be fixed. If you want to go back to your first original credit card as the default payment( which was alleged to be expiring even though it wasn't) , you can delete the original card which Apple will now allow to be deleted because you have a new card payment option for ongoing subscriptions, and then re-add the original first credit card as your default payment. Whew. Ridiculous and cannot understand why Apple allowed this glitch and didn't fix it earlier in the month.

FOUND THE FIX -

If you go into setting under wallet&apple pay you can remove the card and bypass the “active subscription” error. Once I did that I cleared out my apps to refresh and then went back and added the card thru the same “wallet and Apple Pay” setting. Once you do that you can go and download something in the App Store. It will ask you to log in again but it give you the option to link your card back to your account and should be back to normal

I was able to fix it now. The issue does not allow you to even download applications. What I did is go to settings and then to Wallet and Apple Pay. I deleted the payment method from there. Afterwards, when buying from itunes and redownloading Instagram, it asked me to change the expiry date. The good thing is that the card was in the system without the expiry date. I added the expiry date and everything started to work again.

Called Apple support as I also could not remove my card due to subscriptions. You have to add another card. I added my debit card and then removed my credit card from wallet and from Apple ID under payment and shipping. Then I added the credit card back in, removed my debit card and then added the credit card back to my Apple wallet. They said their system had changed expiry on all cards to Dec 31,2023.

I was having this exact same problem for the last 2 days error message saying card about to expire and my car is still good for til 2027 until last night after reading @Picanmix post in here regarding this issue. I did what they suggested deleted my card details from the AppleID Settings NOT Applewallet and then added the card back, HOWEVER….I noticed that when I added the expiration date for the card as 01/27 like we normally do because platforms usually only ask for the last 2 digits of the expiration year I got another error message saying my expiration year had to be after 12/23 and 01/24 and at first I did not understand it because I’m putting in 1/27 🤔

Then💡……The system thinks the date is January 27, 2024 instead of January of 2027 so I had to put in the full expiration year as 01/2027 so the system doesn’t look at 27 as a day but a year SMH. After these changes I’ve been using my card just fine since late last night.

OK I've been having this same issue and just got off the phone with an apple payment rep. Here is the fix for me and probably will help you too.

go to settings > click your name+ icloud > go to payment and shipping

If your like me you will probably see your card info and that it says it's expired. Click here and update your info. For me, I was being and idiot and putting in my expiration as 06/27 when it should have been 06/2027 - a four digit expiration instead of 2 like what's on my card. Once I updated that, my issues were fixed. Music and purchases worked again.

What the rep told me is that this section of payment methods is DIFFERENT from our apple wallet card info. What happens is if we have a card that expires soon or has expired and we update the card info IN THE WALLET, the info in this section (the one above), does not update. You have to go into this section (the one mentioned above) to update this info since this is what is used for for media/subscription purposes. Once your info is updated and verified, everything starts working again. I had a HBO Max subscription asking me to update my card expiration date on my card. I thought my Apple Wallet info was used to charge to my media/subscriptions and it is not. My account was on hold because of the information that was missing causing all my media that is on my icloud account to be put on a hold. The Apple ID account was held because this information was not updated and they could not charge my card, NOT MY APPLE PAY. Hope this helps and saves you all the frustration its been causing others.

Encountered the same issue. I logged into my Apple account on a computer, removed the card levered to my account, then added it back and the problem was resolved. Would likely work on your phone/iPad/device if you logged into your account using a browser.

Quick update. I talked to a supervisor and they said I had to remove the card from my Apple wallet, then add it back. It worked and I’m able to make purchases on my phone again. I recommend trying that instead of trying to remove it from your settings. Hopefully this helps you all ^^

Apple should publicly address this because it seems to affect everyone. Not cool!

so the workaround was to just add your PayPal account to Apple, then you can easily delete your credit card without having to cancel subscriptions etc. Then add it back to your Apple wallet with updated dates and code and that’s it.

now it will work.

not complicated but it should not of happened in the first place and they should of announced this to everyone

Same situation…had to add another card, remove original and the new card becomes default payment. Go back in and add original card back in and remove the other card and now your original is back as default card. Purchases are now successful

Just spoke with Apple Pay support and got it fixed.

1) I added a new credit card to Apple Pay

2) Removed old “problem” card

3) Added back the old card

problem fixed. I guess the key was to add a new payment method before trying to remove the existing method.

hope this works for you

I went on a computer. Logged in to update purchasing method. Add a new card. Removed the one that was "expiring" and then added it back. That worked for me.