Developers and waiting, are we just going to have to deal with it?

No matter who you are, an actual developer or just an iPhone fan yourself, it seems as if everyone has heard about the waiting brought on by the App Store process. Quite frankly, I think it is a problem that Apple really needs to address to calm the storm. Many developers are becoming very frustrated with the numerous things they must wait for with their apps. It all begins with the actual purchase of the developer registration in the first place. I was lucky enough to only have to wait about a day, but some developers are experiencing much longer waits that can put their presence in the App Store at risk if they already have apps up. However, it doesn’t stop there.

I can understand that the reviewing process for apps can’t be instantaneous; that would be nearly impossible (unless, of course, they just stopped reviewing apps). Yet, some developers are experiencing waits of over a month for their app to get accepted. A day or two—to even a week—is understandable for news app (and about a day for updates), but a month is just ridiculous. Some people have quit their jobs to make a living out of this, so it is unfair of Apple to make them have to wait on their own source of revenue.

And I’m not done yet, there is still more.

In order for paid apps to appear in the store after they get reviewed, developers must have a contract with their bank account and tax information cleared. This is all done online. I’m currently on my 18th day of waiting for this to clear, and I’ve heard of some people waiting up to three months. I get that bank account information can be tricky, but that length of time is a little much, especially considering there is no phone number for that division of the iPhone Developer Program to check on the status, and they don’t enjoy answering e-mails (I’ve sent them a few already).

I guess it boils down to the fact that Apple needs to do something. If it requires hiring more people, I believe it will be worth it, making a lot of developers much more happy. I’m aware the response for this SDK and development platform is huge, but Apple needs to prepare themselves for that in a much more efficient way.