Report from TechCrunch
In Brief – Google has announced that it is offering app developers in the UK the ability to use other billing services for in-app payments in their Android apps besides Google’s own payments system. The company’s “user choice billing” program allows developers to add approved payments processor alternatives alongside Google’s service, and gives the app developer a 4% discount on Google’s fees when a payment is made through a non-Google alternative. The plan was designed in response to the many legal and regulatory challenges directed at Google (and Apple) for allegedly controlling in-app payments processing to extract large fees on purchases made on Android devices (and iPhones). The UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) began its antitrust investigation in 2021, and in 2023 Google proposed offering user choice billing to settle the probe. Although the CMA opened a consultation on Google’s proposal, the regulator eventually closed the matter and announced that it would instead address the app store rules and policies of Google and Apple, including in-app payments and fees, though the agency’s new regulatory authority under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act (DMCC). As the CMA continues developing its DMCC regulations for Google, the UK joins the US, EU, Japan, South Korea, India, and others in Google’s expanded payments program.
Context – Epic Games’ 2020 lawsuits against Apple and Google in US federal court kicked off a now nearly five-year global campaign by large app developers to regulate Apple and Google. While initial complaints focused on in-app payments, that was never the real point. It was always about fee levels. So, when Google and Apple eventually offered payments options, complaints continued. In the EU, the Commission has objected to both companies’ app store rules for not meeting the DMA’s rules on “steering”, meaning giving users easy enough access to lower fee alternatives. In the US, federal judges are covering much the same ground in the cases filed by Epic. Japan is regulating the two giants’ app stores. And now so is the UK.