Changing country makes you lose all your apps

Question

Level 1

20 points

Changing country makes you lose all your apps

I have just moved from Italy to France, I opened a bank account and was planning to close my bank account in Italy.

What I discovered is that when you change region in the Apple Store (which you are forced to do, since the credit card must belong to a bank in the region) you basically lose all your purchases done beforehand. When I changed the region in the AppStore all my purchases were gone, none were listed. Fortunately when I went back to the old region all the purchases were again there.

I was told by Apple Support that if you keep the applications in your computer they will continue to function. Unfortunately I don't think it is completely true. What happens to updates? If the app is not listed among your purchases I doubt it will be updated. What if I need to do a clean install? Not all applications can simply be copied to the Applications folder, often the system said the application is corrupted and I need to download it again from the AppStore, what then?

I spent a lot of money on Pro Apps, now I am forced to keep a bank account open in Italy just to keep a credit card for the App Store, I just cannot afford to change region and risk having to buy all the apps again.

Is there any way to keep your purchases when you change region? I understand that different regions have different taxing rules, but if I bought an app in one country, this good is mine, I am not going to have to pay for it again just because I go to live elsewhere, it makes no sense.

I know not many people change country of residence, so this might not be a priority, but please try to find a solution.

Posted on Jun 12, 2016 4:22 AM

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Answer 1

Best reply

Peter Miller

Level 4

2,342 points

Jun 13, 2016 5:31 PM in response to mskofic

Hi and welcome to Apple Support Communities,

Just so you know purchases made in one coutry's store are NOT carried over, as far as I know just make sure you are logged into the store of the country where made the purchases, any purchases made in that country's store should stay there.

For example:

If I make purchases in the Australian Store and Move to the US, I must keep my store as the Austrlian store to keep my purchases; if I change my store to the US one my purchases will disappear.

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Answer 2

Jun 12, 2016 4:44 AM in response to mskofic

Here is the contact information for Apple Italy and France, try talking to either and they should help you.

Apple Italy:

800915904

Apple France:

Metropolitain:

(33) 0805 540 003

DOM-TOM:

(33) 0825 77 00 35

Also try an Apple Store, an Genius may be able to asist you.

There are stores in:

Marseille

Lille

Nice

Strasbourg

Aix-en Provence

Dijon

Bordeaux

Puteaux

Montpellier

Saint Herblain

Carrousel du Louvre (Paris)

Opéra (Paris)

Lyon (two stores)

Lieusaint

Marne-la-Valle

Rosny-Sous-Bois

Le Chesnay

Velizy-Villacoublay

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Answer 3

Rysz

Level 8

44,391 points

Jun 13, 2016 5:49 PM in response to Peter Miller

Interested in knowing...

When you switch countries, do the purchases actually disappear, or they just no longer can be updated via the new country store?

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Answer 4

Dah•veed

Level 9

64,729 points

Jun 29, 2016 3:41 PM in response to Rysz

The apps don't disappear, it's that when you switch your account to a new Store, the Purchased list isn't yet populated because you haven't bought anything in that Store yet. If your previously purchased app is also sold in the new Store, when you go through the motions of buying an app again, in the final steps of the sale, the Mac App Store realizes that you have bought this app previously and offers the download/update for free. You cannot update apps that are not sold in the new Store.

Mac mini, OS X Yosemite 10.10.3; Apple Watch, 38 mm silver AL, Watch OS 1.0.1; iPad Air 2 & iPhone 6+, iOS 8.3

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Answer 5

Rysz

Level 8

44,391 points

Jun 13, 2016 6:10 PM in response to Dah•veed

That's what I thought (as opposed to the first reply).

Thanks for confirming this.

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Answer 6

mskofic Author

Level 1

20 points

Jun 29, 2016 3:44 PM in response to Dah•veed

This actually happened with an application I purchased: I would "buy" it and at the last moment the store would say I already purchased it and I didn't need to pay again. It's really good to know this, I thought I was stuck with the original Apple Store. Maybe this should be explained, because without your comment I thought changing store would make me lose all previous purchases.

Thanks!

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