we need to release an App for one of our customers but we got rejected, we are told that this app does not comply with guidelines 3.2:
Guideline 3.2 - Business
During our review, we found that this app was designed for a specific business or organization and not for general distribution on the App Store. Business apps available on the App Store are meant for use by a wide variety of external customers around the world.
This rejection is a consequence of our reply to their request for metadata:
- Who is the target audience?
- How do users obtain an account?
- Is this app meant for internal distribution in your own company, in the company of one target client, or in multiple target clients’ companies?
- In which countries will this app primarily be distributed?
- If this app is meant for internal distribution, will the app be accessible by both internal and external partners? Or will it be exclusive to in-house employees?
Here comes the problem: this app won't be used internally to our customer, it will be used by internal or external partners distributed across Europe, Asia, South America (basically they're everywhere), it won't certainly be used only by in-house employees. More probably it will be used by truck drivers who owns their truck and got a partnership with some minor shipping agency.
How can we distribute this app? We cannot use Apple Business Manager as we cannot register every driver's device, we can't use MDM either. There's no way to release an app without passing through Apple (similar to .apk usage). Do we need to appeal to the review board?
EDIT: To be even more clear with our customer situation, this is the explanation i gave to Apple Review Board:
The target audience is not directly decided by Albini & Pitigliani S.p.a. (ALPI from now on), it's gonna be whomever works directly or indirectly for ALPI, meaning that a "freelance truck driver" can download the app and transport a payload for ALPI even without ever contacting them but by working for one of the internal or external partners of ALPI. Let me clarify another thing: ALPI has got more than 1000 employees, its presence is worldwide with more than 20000 customers and has got 94 offices spread in Europe, Asia, Africa, South and North America as you can see here https://www.alpiworld.it/network/network.asp. The app is gonna be used by a wide variety of external customers around the world. ALPI think its offices are going to be able to register users manually, but we could implement a sign in to make it compliant to Apple Guidelines and maybe that could even make it easier for ALPI. Replying to your third question, this app won't be used internally to ALPI, won't be used necessarily in a company of one target client of ALPI, nor necessarily in multiple target clients's companies, in fact it can be used by anyone who needs to track a shipment directly or indirectly related to ALPI. This app will be distributed worldwide, as i already told you some lines ago.
