How to Prevent Your Kids From Running Huge App Store Bills on Your iOS Device

Are you one of those people who always get a shock upon receiving their credit card bill that happens to reflect a huge bill from iTunes Store without their knowledge? There have been an increasing number of stories in the news where a child has accumulated a large bill on the App Store without their parents’ knowledge. Most parents are baffled. They apparently don't know how they can prevent this from happening again. Fret no more. Parental controls can be used to disable in-app purchases so you won't receive any more surprises from your billing statements. Checkout the steps below on how to prevent your kids from making purchases without your knowledge.

Prevent Kids From Running Huge App Store Bills on Your iOS Device

First thing to do is to go to your iOS device's Home screen and tap Settings.

Tap General, then tap Restrictions.


From here, tap Enable Restrictions.


You will then be prompted to enter a 4-digit passcode. This passcode will be required to make changes to the Restrictions settings so make sure it is different from the passcode you use to unlock your iOS device. Please note that in case you lose or forgot the Restrictions Passcode, you will need to perform a factory restore to remove it. For instructions on how to perform a factory restore, follow the steps posted here.


Re-enter the Restrictions Passcode to confirm it.


Now go to In-App Purchases and turn it off by sliding the slider from right to left. The slider should now turn gray.


Next, move to Require Password and tap on it. By default, this is set to 15 minutes, which means that once you have entered your Apple ID to make purchases in iTunes, your iOS device will remember the password for 15 minutes and will not prompt you to re-enter the password when you make another purchase within the time limit. In this case, if you purchased an app and handed your iOS device immediately to your child for him/her to play with, he/she has a time window to make purchases in the App Store without having to supply a password. To prevent this, change Require Password to Immediately as shown below.


That is it. Changing those two settings will relieve you from running the risk of having your kids make unexpected purchases in the App Store. In addition, they will not be able to disable the restriction without entering the Restriction Password you set up. Another tip I can give is to refrain from giving your Apple ID and password to your kids. That will save you a whole lot of headache.

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