Problem deleting photos in family album

TidBITS Talk
1

My wife and I are members of the iCloud family defined in my iCloud settings. I am the family head (so to say) and she is a family member.

We use mainly the shared calendar, where we both can define, modify and delete our own and each other’s appointments. This works great.

The family function also provides a family photo album. We assumed it should work the same way as the calendar, meaning that each of us would be able to put pictures in it and also delete any picture, no mater who put it into the family album.

My wife can delete single photos in the family album only if they were added by herself, using a long tap and selecting delete in the upcoming window.

However, my wife apparently cannot delete single photos in the family album if they were added by me. When she opens the family album and selects single photos, the delete function (waste paper bin in the upper left corner) is shown as inactive (greyed out). However, if she selects all photos by tapping select - all (upper right corner), the delete function becomes active!

Is this supposed to work this way? (bug or feature?)

I could not receive an useful answers in the Apple communities, that is why I am asking here.

Thank you,

Andre Peternell
Frankfurt, Germany

2

I wish to add that this is the way it works (or does not) when my wife uses her iPad with iOS 13.2 when trying to delete photos in the family album.

However, she can delete any photo - no matter who added it to the album - if she uses Fotos on a Mac.

Hmmmm…

3

I’m hesitant to say this for sure, but I think it’s something that’s happening in your specific situation. We have a Family album too, and I can definitely delete photos that Tonya added to it.

You don’t say if you can delete photos that your wife adds to Family, which would be the parallel to my situation.

4

I can delete photos added to Family by my wife.

The problem does not exist when using Fotos on Macs, it happens only when she uses her ipad pro 12", which is her preferred gadget.

Thanks anyway!

5

I don’t quite have the same gear as you to confirm this, but in checking on Tonya’s older iPhone 6s (iOS 12.4.1), I’m thinking that this behavior is intentional.

As the family organizer, I can delete photos she uploaded, but even though she is an adult in the family group, she cannot delete photos that I uploaded to the Family album on her iPhone. It seems odd that this is different in Photos on the Mac for your wife—when I test on Tonya’s Mac running Mojave, I get a dialog telling me that she can’t delete photos that other people in the family uploaded.