Locked out of Family Sharing for 364 days

not only is it totally ridiculous, but why is there no warning about this? "Hey, I see you're about to unjoin family share, just so you know you will be blocked for an entire year because apple rocks if you do this again!"

How hard is that to have that as a warning?

Same problem here. My wife and I made the mistake while trying to set it up for our family.

Thread here: Re: Exceed limit family sharing

1. Two attempts is not enough.

2. A whole year? Too long.

Thanks Apple. I'll try calling support this morning (Australia time)

Just contacted Apple as I have also fell foul to the same issue - I knew I was wasting my breath but wanted to have my say! I told them that their own support page on Leaving Family Sharing doesn't even mention this (Leave Family Sharing) and that the fact that their is no warning on your iDevice when you go to leave is ridiculous. They said that they have had many many wonderful calls about the issue but as it stands I will be able to take advantage of the wonderful new iOS8 features just in time for iOS9 to be launched - happy days! 😠

JDChudley wrote:

Just contacted Apple as I have also fell foul to the same issue - I knew I was wasting my breath but wanted to have my say! I told them that their own support page on Leaving Family Sharing doesn't even mention this (Leave Family Sharing) ...

That's changed then since you posted this just a few hours ago, though the page update data still reads Sept 17.. That page reads very near the top, "After you leave a family, you can join or set up a new one. However you can only switch to a different family group once per year."

Frusturated with Apple policy wrote:

Apple doesn't care about child safety or security. Why are you required to use a credit card instead of a debit card on the account?

Because...

To comply with child online privacy protection laws, you will use the CVV or security code from a valid credit card as part of providing your parental consent. If the card on file is a debit card or another payment method, you’ll be asked to provide a credit card before you can continue. After you create the child's Apple ID, you can change your payment method back to a debit card.

From Family Sharing and Apple ID for your child - Apple Support

Same issue with me. I entered their chat support. They have zero way to fix this but said if you call the apple care number they can fix it. It requires account verification over the phone. I'm currently in the queue to speak with apple care. I'll post shortly if they could fix the issue or not.

I just ran into this issue while trying to debug an issue I was having with a timeeout invite, Ended up here after , I haven't made the phone call yet, but this isn't making me optimistic.

tl;dr: me too

I am having the same issue. I am seeing this problem on the Apple support page in multiple places. Apple will be forced to come up with a fix. I Hope. The thing that annoys me the most is that there was no warning or prompt telling me that I was about to lock myself out. At the very least there should have been a warning or something. It was way to easy to lock myself out. I find the fact that it was so easy to do a big part of the problem. Only can join twice a year? Heck I do a full restore my IPad more often then that Because I am one of those really picky people that want my stuff to always be perfect. That's why I buy Apple products. Apple caters to my OCD and perfectionism. 🙂 I'm sure I'm not the only one around here. So this two times a year limit isn't going To cut it. Come on Apple. Atleast give users a way to reset it. Maybe through icloud Manager or something. if Apple is worried about people abusing this feature ok fine, then don't make it so obvious to reset. But at least make it possible to do so for people like me. And don't put a limit on it. you would be surprised how often some people do a full restore on their device. Far more frequent then twice a year. That's for sure. Especially for us developers. Remove the limit, or give us an easy way to reset it Without limits. Such a waste of a great feature.

I had the EXACT SAME THING happen to me. Set it up initially per the instructions, it didn't work. Tried it again, didn't work. Tried having my spouse as the originator, didn't work....and BAM! Locked out for 364 days. I hope they fix this. They make this feature a sales pitch, then it doesn't work and then they lock you out of it for a year? Come on!!!!!!! Please post a solution if you find one. Thanks everyone!

Just had a conversation with Apple Care Advisor.

He told me they have no info on this issue, nor do they have any solution yet.

He also told that he will look further into this and contact me when new info is available.

Two minutes later he called me back and told that they are aware of the problem, and that it is currently being investigated, but no more info.

He also mentioned something about engineering department working on it, if I understood correctly.

So if you guys have the problem, you should probably contact Apple Care via phone as well as posting it on the web. The more feedback they get, the faster solution will come up.

same issue here locked out, wasn't working correctly could see one family member stuff and other was getting error that it was used with a different account. I thought it was because of the original id being a yahoo one and i put in wires email that we use being the iCloud one. signed out and bam 364 days. What a crock!

I haven't been locked out yet, but I did remove and re-add my wife from family sharing because it wasn't showing her my purchases. It still isnt showing her my purchases but luckily I found this thread so I dont remove her again. I agree, this needs a fix ASAP.

Wanted to add my name to the "petition" lol

I was having the same issues setting up family sharing between my phone and my wife's phone, and tried exactly what everyone else seems to have tried only to be blindsided by a 364 day suspension. I just got off the phone with tech support and have reached the same disappointing endpoint: the initial support guy forwarded me to his supervisor, who did some more checking into the issue, and eventually came back on and said that there was nothing that could be done. I was assured that he would personally get back to me when something got figured out. Pretty disappointed that there wasn't a reset worked into the limit. Like others have said, this was one of the main features I was looking forward to using, and now I'm locked out of it.

Ran into the same issue. Added me as an Organizer and invited my wife to family sharing. No content was shared though. Restored the phone of my wife twice as well as removing and re-adding her to family sharing. After that - 364 days locked out. I am scared what is going to happen once she and I get our iPhone 6's by tomorrow. Will it eventually lock my account too then? Never was aware that this could happen. Haven't read the fine print either; guess I am too used to Apple's ease of use products and services. Hope they will still do something for people like us, but honestly cannot see it happening too soon. 😟