Steve Jobs, Why Have You Forsaken Me?
For Christmas, my friend Clayton got me an iTunes gift card. He did so specifically because he knows I’m too cheap to buy any paid apps for my iPhone, but he knew I’d appreciate being able to get my hands on some sweet, sweet iPhone apps.
I redeemed my card to my account and then bought an app, but the app got charged to my credit card instead, which I thought was pretty annoying. So I took my credit card information out of iTunes, so that the only payment info they would have would be the gift card. And then I tried to buy another app, but iTunes asked for credit card info and there was no way to say, “Just use the damn gift card!” It was super frustrating, because I could see in the upper right of my iTunes that I have $50 worth of credit! So I tweeted my frustration, figuring that the geeks would know how I could fix this problem. And I got responses right away, but unfortunately it was not good news. Apparently in Canada you can’t use iTunes gift certs to buy apps due to some sort of “tax laws and commerce restrictions for software in Canada.”
What a bunch of crap.
Image Credit: Posted by Zoë Campbell on Flickr.
That's so crap it's hard to put into words.
Exactly!
Check out this blog: http://artoftheiphone.com/
They often publicize free apps or paid apps that become free for a certain amount of time. Good luck in your quest for the freebies!
Thanks for the tip! I heart free!
That is indeed crap, since my sisters and I got my Mom an iTunes gift card for the very same purpose.
Yup, and neither Apple nor Revenue Canada has adequately explained why this is so. I discovered the same thing last year.
You can get around this, sort of, by getting yourself a U.S. iTunes card and setting up an account under another email address. Then you can redeem the U.S. card and use it to buy apps under that account.
Yes, it's a lame workaround, but it also lets you get U.S.-only content (TV shows, movies, songs, etc.).
Oh, you have to provide some sort of U.S. address too, but those are easy enough to find.
Only issue there is then you have to remember which account you "bought" stuff with and logoff one and into another when you want to do updates.
You can also get prepaid Mastercards/Visas and list them as "US credit cards" for a US account with money in it. Of course, prepaid MCs and Visas are a rip-off.
I have nothing to add to the conversation so far, but I would like to point out that I was:
– amused that you needed to go to flickr to get that photo
– saddened that this is the only article that comes up when I click on the bunch of crap tag