Curious if other partners have had any success reporting App Store rule violations.
We recently got an audit notice asking us to update a listing image because it contained “the most powerful”, which violates guideline 4.3.4 (unsubstantiated claims). Totally fair, we updated it immediately.
What’s frustrating is that there are multiple apps currently showing things like:
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“#1 [category] app” in listing images
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“FREE” and other pricing info prominently displayed in images (which conflicts with rule 4.2.2 about pricing info in images)
Some of these listings have looked like this for over a year, and we’ve reported them several times, but nothing ever seems to change.
To make things worse, last year we also had our app temporarily demoted for two weeks due to a Google Ads issue involving the Shopify trademark keyword (and it wasn’t even a proper keyword in the add. We appeared on Shopify search results because we didn’t have it set up as a negative keyword).
At the same time, we continue to see competitor apps actively bidding on “Shopify” keywords for months, which, according to the partner trademark guidelines, is not allowed (as we learnt the hard way). Of course, we’ve also reported this many times, to no visible results whatsoever.
So I’m genuinely curious:
Has anyone here actually seen action taken after reporting listing or advertising violations?
It feels like enforcement can be very strict for some apps while similar violations remain visible elsewhere for long periods of time, and it’s honestly discouraging to see competitors repeatedly ignore the same rules without any visible consequence.
If anyone can shed some light on how these reports are reviewed, or whether there is a way to prioritize long-standing or repeat violations, that would be really helpful for partners trying to follow the rules.
Would also love to hear from other developers about their experiences reporting violations and whether they’ve ever seen those reports lead to action.