Convert existing Apple ID to Child Apple ID

I'm still getting that message, even when sticking to the 13 year old limit. Is there anything else that has to be done, maybe? His primary e-mail is a Gmail address, so maybe I have to change that to the iCloud one?

Spudge25 wrote:

Back when Apple used to charge for email accounts, before icloud, I set up a family account which was a discount price for family addresses so my son had an Apple ID since a very young age (6-7) and I could scan all his sent/received emails before they were sent on to him/the recipient. So apple used to have child accounts. Now, they seem to have forgotten about them, ditched all under 13s and blocked the change DoB feature. Massive let down from apple that I would like to see resolved soon.

Everyone gets one birth, why do you need to enter more than one?

Wow, my post got removed for telling someone about an error they may have made about the topic of this thread? this thread is very useful. Apple customers are excited about the new family share feature and want to be able to use it. In order for children to use ipads/iPod touch in the past parent had to set up adult accounts for their children. Now those same accounts can't be used with the family share feature and until Apple has a fix what is the problem changing the age of the user. The same user that likely already uses an incorrect age? are you saying apple devices shouldn't be used by kids 13 years and younger? This just seems ridiculous to me.

Parents aren't trying to change the age of their kids. They are just trying to keep the account their children have likley used for years along with all the saved data and apps.

Thestrategery1 wrote:

Wow, my post got removed for telling someone about an error they may have made about the topic of this thread? this thread is very useful. Apple customers are excited about the new family share feature and want to be able to use it. In order for children to use ipads/iPod touch in the past parent had to set up adult accounts for their children. Now those same accounts can't be used with the family share feature and until Apple has a fix what is the problem changing the age of the user. The same user that likely already uses an incorrect age? are you saying apple devices shouldn't be used by kids 13 years and younger? This just seems ridiculous to me.

Parents aren't trying to change the age of their kids. They are just trying to keep the account their children have likley used for years along with all the saved data and apps.

Let's be honest here.

The position they find themselves in now is because of a previous lie, if the child's age had been honestly entered this issue would not exist.

There is a lesson here.

you sir are a troll and it's actually really funny so I'll roll with it...

You are incorrect, as some users had stated they had child accounts years ago when Apple supported them. They used the correct ages and they are still running into this issue today.

You are correct that if the child's birthday had been correctly entered this issue wouldn't have happened. But the child would likely not have been using an apple product since there would have been no way for them to use the App Store, iTunes, imessage, or FaceTime.

Explain for me the solution these parents had, I would love to see that there was one. 🙂

I don't know what exactly you're trying to accomplish here, but you're not helping.

It's a rather simple issue. Apple has created Family accounts. Parents want to adequate their children to the new form. I'm trying and can't do it. My boy is 8 and I can't change his profile to his proper age in order to get the full benefits of the new account mode. I'd like Apple to offer an option.

I agree. This is a daft oversight on Apple's part. I've decided just to ignore Family Sharing for now and keep using our old system where all purchases need proactive parental approval and password to be applied. Given the frankly asinine and pointless comments made by one particular commentator to this thread, I hope Apple at least has an ounce more common sense to help users resolve this.

I don't care about all the ethical questions you guys have brought up. My kids were setup properly as far as I'm aware and I have no need to lie about their age as they are under 13. But when I setup families, they were listed as adults. Is there a way to correct this or not?

Not a great answer, especially if you've made purchases on the account already (Fortunately we didn't, we only used them for FaceTime and Lego email). I've heard that you can do a one-time merge of two apple IDs, but don't know for sure. That may have only been for legacy accounts. You could try creating a second account and calling support to try and merge them. Let us know what happens;)

I was having issues when changing the date. I finally got it to work by only changing the year and NOT the month and date. I left the month and day as is and modified the year to 2001. This made the "Ask to Buy" option appear within the Family Sharing options on my phone.

Please help me understand how we could be honest before? I could have been honest. This would have meant that my son had a nice and shiny iPod Touch but not being able to use it. When I created his Apple ID, I was required to enter a birth date, and this birth date was required to be for a 13 year old or older. I could have used my own Apple ID instead, but that would have given my son access to buying unlimited apps. Not really realistic. I could also have created a new Apple ID in my own name, just for his iPod Touch. None of these options are really good. We really want him to buy his own Apps and other content. But we don't want him to lose all the content in the future. Both alternatives would have resulted in him losing his content at some point in time. This basically means that the only alternative to specifying an incorrect birth date, was to not buy an iPod Touch.

jmvdkolk wrote:

Please help me understand how we could be honest before? I could have been honest.

You be honest by not telling lies, and not teaching children that it is an acceptable way to get something.

You chose to lie.

Correct. I chose to have my son use an Apple device that he was not allowed to use without lying. Sue me. But the issue really is that Apple does not say that you cannot use their hardware below the age of 13. Apparently it is acceptable that Apple sells their hardware to kids below the age of 13, and does not actually allow them to use the hardware without lying. So we should all have returned our Apple hardware? Did you? Or are you in this discussion without having ever having been in this situation? How old are your kids?

Why would I sue you?, it makes no difference to me what you do to gain an advantage for your child.

But your question was

Please help me understand how we could be honest before?

And the answer is, you could have told the truth.

And the ages of my children is hardly any business of strangers.

You guys are solving nothing with this back and forth. Please just submit an Apple feature request to allow existing accounts to use the "ask to buy" feature when using the same payment account. Also ask that feature be extended beyond 13 years of age. It shouldn't matter how old someone is, they should have to ask.

Many people falsified information to create child accounts knowingly and can't really be that upset for the steps Apple has taken to prevent purchase issues. They don't need to take the time to undue those protections to give us such a feature. Also, since most of us didn't sit there with their child and tell them to lie when creating an account, so you can give the parenting issues arrest as well.

GIve Apple constructive feed back, and work around the issue as you have in the past, or create new child accounts and abandon the old one.