Stripe Connector for Apple App Store
Stripe’s Connector for the Apple App Store lets you import subscription purchases from the Apple App Store into Stripe Revenue Recognition automatically.
Here are the benefits of using Revenue Recognition for Apple App Store:
- Near real-time availability: Set up daily, automated imports from the Apple App Store. This minimizes manual work and reduces corrections at month-end.
- Increased accuracy: Take timezone differences into account, improving recognition accuracy.
- Improved refund treatment: Link refunds to original purchases, and generate more accurate refund journal entries that adjust deferred revenue instead of treating refunds as negative line items.
- Audit by subscribers: Break down numbers on a per subscriber basis for easier audits.
Get started
To import data from the Apple App Store, set up Stripe’s Connector for the Apple App Store using these instructions. Stripe populates the data in your Revenue Recognition reports within 72 hours.
Backfill historical data
When you onboard, the Connector backfills up to 1 year of historical data.
Handle Apple transactions previously imported through manual data import
If you previously imported data from Apple App Store using Revenue Recognition’s data import feature, you want to avoid double-counting Apple revenue upon switching to the automated Connector.
To migrate from manual data imports to the Apple App Store Connector, delete all Apple transactions from the past year that were uploaded manually through data import CSVs. These will then be replaced with entries generated through the Connector import.
Note
We recommend against deleting data import CSV uploads for Apple transactions that occurred more than 1 year ago because the Connector only backfills up to 1 year of historical data.
Examples
Subscription purchase
Let’s say a subscriber purchases 1 unit of a “News Plan Monthly” subscription on December 3:
- The subscription is valid for a month, which means the service period is from Dec 3 to Jan 3.
- The customer pays 32 USD, but the developer only receives 31 USD.
At the end of January, the summary might look like this:
Account | December | January |
---|---|---|
External Asset | +31 | |
Revenue | +28 | +3 |
Deferred Revenue | +3 | -3 |
- Developer proceeds count toward revenue. We use developer proceeds as revenue, rather than customer price, because the customer price also includes taxes and Apple commissions.
- Revenue gets billed and paid in full on December 3.
- The bulk of the revenue is recognized in December, with a smaller part recognized in January.
Subscription refund
This example uses the following assumptions:
On January 2, a subscriber purchases a three-month subscription that costs 91 USD in the App Store.
- Service period is Jan 2 - April 2.
- The customer pays 91 USD, but the developer receives 90 USD.
- On February 1, the customer receives a full refund.
During a full refund:
- The customer gets their money back.
- Recognized revenue is offset by the refunds in a contra revenue account.
- The unused part of the subscription revenue gets cleared from the deferred revenue.
In this case, the refund reduces the external assets balance by 90 USD. The customer received 30 days of service, so you must add 30 USD back to the external refunds balance. The remainder of the deferred revenue, 60 USD in this case, is also cleared. Here’s what the summary might look like after April ends:
Account | December | January |
---|---|---|
Revenue | +30 | |
Deferred Revenue | +60 | -60 |
External Asset | +90 | -90 |
External Refunds | +30 |
Free trial
Stripe doesn’t generate journal entries for free trials.
Limitations
Because financial reports from the Apple App Store don’t include invoice IDs, we can’t provide an audit by invoice view. The most detailed level of reporting we offer for Apple is audit by subscriber.
We also can’t book tax liability and Apple commissions because Apple doesn’t provide this data.