After noticing that they weren’t receiving the expected amount of App Store revenue, Ecamm and Magnetism Studios went looking for the culprit. It turned out to be additional withholding by the Japanese government that they weren’t aware of.
When developers sell their applications on the iTunes Store, Apple will usually just take its 30 percent cut and pass the rest on to developers. As it turns out, though, that transaction becomes a bit more complicated when certain countries are involved. One such case was recently brought to light by Ecamm and Magnetism Studios, who noticed that they weren’t receiving as much revenue as expected from Japanese sales of their FileMagnet application. They were able to track down the culprit, though: Japanese tax forms.
After wading through the App Store’s sales reports and doing a bit of digging and a few currency conversions, the developers found that 20 percent of the revenue from Japanese sales was missing. As it turns out, the revenue was in the coffers of the Japanese government. According to Apple, a 20 percent withholding is applied unless developers submit tax forms to Japan’s National Tax Agency and the IRS.
Tags: app store