iCloud Family Member Grows Up

Tech Support
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So my son leaves to begin his life in the Army tomorrow. I’m super proud of him and after he completes basic training in about 9 weeks, he’s pretty much on his own. And he’s asked about how he can leave our family plan and just have his own account that he’s financially responsible for (another source of pride). From the little bit of research I’ve done, I’m not sure how to do it in a way where he keeps his music and other things that he’s paid for over the years.

Has anybody else dealt with this problem? Someone who wants to leave a family and retain their stuff? It strikes me that there are going to be a lot of problems like this as our kids grow up.

We’ve tested just using gift cards to give him a balance to bill against and that works fine, but I still get the invoices, which is, in his words, “kinda weird.” And I agree. Any suggestions? Thanks all!

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Son is still on our Apple One and family sharing plan. He’s an officer in the Navy and can easily afford his own but it costs us nothing to add him.

He can still have his own account and participate in family sharing so he has access to the previous content. Anything new he buys becomes his alone.

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As far as I understand, he can leave the family and will retain everything attached to his iCloud account, like music and storage.

If all purchases are done on different account, then he will lose access to those purchases.

Family accounts are just shared seats not content.

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#GoArmy

Have him stay on the account. The least amount of stuff he has to worry about while traversing Boot Camp and A School the better. Trust me if you’re not grown or responsible you will get as much "help"as you require to become an effective employee of the military.

He can always leave at any time and keep the stuff he’s purchased under his AID but what’s the rush?

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Thanks all. Sorry for the delay in getting back. It’s been a hectic few weeks. I appreciate all the advice and we’ll keep him on our plan as long as he wants. BTW, we’ve heard from him a couple of times and he sounds great and his letters are great too. This seems to be a good fit. Thanks again! This is always such a great community.

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I agree with everyone else. Keep him on as long as you can. I went from my parents helping me with things like this to being the one who pays for their iPhones and cell bill. and they are on my iCloud/iTunes account. It became a cyclical type of thing that went from them helping me to me helping them now that they are retired and on a fixed income.

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