Has apple fixed Family sharing for families with divorced parents?

This should have never been a problem and it is absurd that Apple even introduced Family Sharing without considering divorced parents. It seems like it is impossible for two parents to both have access to their kids devices. If a child belongs to one parent's family the other parent has no parental controls, can't use 'find my iPhone', and can't share subscriptions and games with their kids. This question has been asked before but I'm wondering if anyone has figured out a way for two families to share a child with the new updates to iOS.

Posted on Sep 14, 2022 10:15 AM

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Posted on Sep 14, 2022 10:55 AM

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8 replies

Sep 14, 2022 10:47 AM in response to Taylytaytay

I see nothing in Apple documents discussing divorced parents. You are welcome the check:


What is Family Sharing? - Apple Support

Set up Family Sharing - Apple Support

How to share purchases with your family - Apple Support


As far as I can tell, Apple has no requirements about being married or not, or even being truly related. The above documents stipulate the requirements, namely up to 6 Apple IDs, all members being signed into the same country and one person willing to accept responsibility for paying for any purchase other people make. Note, however, that last one only applies if you are using purchase sharing. If you are not then you only need be located in the same country and have 6 people or fewer..


Apple subscriptions are a different matter and don't require purchase sharing be turned on: Share Apple and App Store subscriptions with family members on iPhone - Apple Support




Sep 14, 2022 11:35 AM in response to Limnos

It's not about the subscriptions or the content sharing for me. When I send my 11yr old an invitation to his apple id to be a member of my family and he accepts on his phone it says no because he is already a member of another family. That means I can not have any control over his device or use any of the parental controls for screen time or finding the phone if lost etc. I see not giving parents access to their kids phones as deceitful advertising. We are not talking about a few random cases. About 16% of kids. It's absurd to give a child wide open access to the entire internet 24 hrs a day and then say only one parent can have any control over that device especially when it is advertised as parents have all these controls. Every work around I've been able to see doesn't really address this.

Sep 14, 2022 11:43 AM in response to Limnos

Kids can't be members of two separate families in Apple land. Me and my ex-husband are amicable and we cooperate when it comes to the kids but we don't want to share a family account. I certainly don't want to pay for his new girlfriends subscriptions and they don't want to pay for mine. Apple just needs to decouple the content and subscriptions from the parental controls and location services. I don't see why that's so hard. I was hoping they would fix it but I guess they haven't.

Sep 14, 2022 11:57 AM in response to Limnos

Exactly the problem they say you have all sorts of parental controls but don't say that kids can only be members of one family with one apple id. It doesn't help at all to set up a new apple id because you can't have multiple profiles on the same device. Are my kids supposed to have two phones and two ipads? I don't even care about subscriptions I just want to be able to have parental controls and location services like a parent should.

Sep 14, 2022 10:54 AM in response to Taylytaytay

I can understand what you may be asking, namely sharing purchases when one of the two parents is not willing to open their payment method to the other parent. In that case you don't really meet the requirements set by Apple - and presumably also the media companies who own what Apple sells and likely have some say as to what defines a family - for purchase sharing. I don't know that Apple considers this to be "broken" as such. You don't share a house, you don't share a car, you don't share the same furniture, so etc...


You could perhaps come up with some method allowing you to participate in the system but it would have to be done as one family. Apple apparently accepts debit cards as a method of payment. In that case you could open a bank account specifically for Family Sharing purposes with a specific, limited amount contributed by both of you. You would also have to come to the understanding that each parent had to pay for items using personal Apple ID balance and not the bank balance. That could be reserved exclusively for the children. Obviously this requires you are both on speaking terms. ;-)


This could also be of possible interest: Use a different Apple ID to share purchases with Family Sharing - Apple Support


Sep 14, 2022 11:48 AM in response to Taylytaytay

You can both have access but you must both be in the same family group.


Set up parental controls with Family Sharing on iPhone --> Set up parental controls with Family Sharing on iPhone - Apple Support


As for your 11 year old:


Move a child to another group using Family Sharing - Move a child to another group using Family Sharing - Apple Support - "You can't remove a child under 13 years old from your family group, but you can move them to another group or delete their account."


Note, however, there are limits as to how frequently you can change families.


Sometimes problems arise with settings needing refreshing:

- Try signing out of accounts and back in again.

- Restarting is a simple step that can resolve many unexpected behaviors.


If a problem persists, particularly over several days, try contacting Apple for assistance:


Click here --> Choose your country or region - Official Apple Support Select your country, then a product. If you don't see one that handles your issue then keep experimenting with selections until you reach one that gets you a chat session or a telephone call and get the representative to redirect you.


or:


"See a list of Apple phone numbers around the world."

Click here --> Contact Apple for support and service - Apple Support


If you have comments then please send them to Apple. The people replying here are simply other users like yourself and we can only guide people to documents about what Apple says.


Sep 14, 2022 01:33 PM in response to Taylytaytay

Again there is nothing anybody replying to you on these boards can do. I have not heard of any solution in the many topics that arise. You need to contact Apple.


Many companies say things but until you read the details of what they say you cannot assume anything. Yes, there is parental control but that does not mean in all situations.

This thread has been closed by the system or the community team. You may vote for any posts you find helpful, or search the Community for additional answers.

Has apple fixed Family sharing for families with divorced parents?

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