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IB closing inactive accounts.
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I quickly went through this whole thread as I also once got a message that my account will be closed. I didn't get an explanation as to why but I suppose because of inactivity. So I called them and they said that I can ignore the message and I didn't insist on knowing the reason.
In your case, shivashad, I got the impression you're hiding some information or you are not really interested to find out the reason why IB requests you close your account. That is annoying. You play a game no one is really interested in.
In your case, shivashad, I got the impression you're hiding some information or you are not really interested to find out the reason why IB requests you close your account. That is annoying. You play a game no one is really interested in.
What is with all the vitriol directed against sivashad? The guy's command of the English language is obviously choppy and lacking subtlety, but that's certainly not a crime and (taken at face value) his position sounds fairly sympathetic to me:
"Based on information received by the IB Compliance Department, we have determined to terminate our relationship with you."
...
"Please do not respond with further requests for information or stall this process any further.
Please proceed IMMEDIATELY to the Interactive Brokers website and transfer your account. There will be no further delays permitted on this action.
We look forward to your IMMEDIATE compliance with the above account."
Note the parts I've highlighted.
I'm a non-"ethnic", white, law-abiding, native USA citizen, and I'm telling you that kind of talk would have me extremely worried. If I was not a native-born citizen, it would scare the shit out of me. If I was from any country with sizable Muslim population (like sivashad is... at least, I'm 95% sure he's Southeast Asian), I'd be terrified.
IB "found out" information about me, yet refuse to tell me what it is--they just want me to send identification documents IMMEDIATELY?
And they're not even asking civilly. They're (virtually) screaming at the guy like he's a criminal. I don't care how overdue his account is or how many stupid questions he's asked, there is NO excuse for IB's hostile attitude.
Of course, you could argue that maybe the guy is a terrorist or something, but I'd rather think that, if I were a terrorist, my first instinct would not be to rush onto ET and start pasting my emails for everyone to see.
(More to the point, if I was the the FBI or the Department of Homeland Security, my crafty sting operation would not involve mysterious statements and overt hostility.)
It's just sad that so many posters have taken a stunning example of broker assholishness and disrespect and instead claimed that the trader must be hiding something because he didn't roll over and send/re-send all his credentials without explanation.
*I* would want an explanation, and no that doesn't make me a criminal. Even if I were a criminal, IB isn't the FBI. (If the IB thinks that this is a job for the FBI or DoHS, maybe they should call them instead of being deliberately mysterious and rude and insulting to a paying customer.)
Everyone "has to" comply with the whims of a for-profit corporation? For the love of all that's holy... why?
Good lord. I'm no bleeding heart liberal (anti-abortion, anti-gun control, pro-states' rights, anti-welfare, and to a large extent pro-racial profiling) but what you're implying isn't patriotism at all... it's fascism. Hell, it's not even fascism, because that would imply some kind of direct governmental oversight.
IB is not a governmental agency. If IB does not have a legal reason (such as: "In order to comply with paragraphs blahblahblah of the Patriot Act"), no one "has to" do anything.
For example: in absence of a specific legal statute, Sivashad doesn't "have to" jump through extra hoops just to access his own assets, nor does IB "have to" act like a jackass and abuse its own customers.
Disclaimer: This is, of course, still very much a one-sided story. The point of this post was not to say that I believe Sivashad's claims absolutely; rather, in the absence of additional information, I see absolutely no reason to believe that Sivashad has done anything wrong and I fully understand his desire for additional information before complying with IB's request.
"Based on information received by the IB Compliance Department, we have determined to terminate our relationship with you."
...
"Please do not respond with further requests for information or stall this process any further.
Please proceed IMMEDIATELY to the Interactive Brokers website and transfer your account. There will be no further delays permitted on this action.
We look forward to your IMMEDIATE compliance with the above account."
Note the parts I've highlighted.
I'm a non-"ethnic", white, law-abiding, native USA citizen, and I'm telling you that kind of talk would have me extremely worried. If I was not a native-born citizen, it would scare the shit out of me. If I was from any country with sizable Muslim population (like sivashad is... at least, I'm 95% sure he's Southeast Asian), I'd be terrified.
IB "found out" information about me, yet refuse to tell me what it is--they just want me to send identification documents IMMEDIATELY?
And they're not even asking civilly. They're (virtually) screaming at the guy like he's a criminal. I don't care how overdue his account is or how many stupid questions he's asked, there is NO excuse for IB's hostile attitude.
Of course, you could argue that maybe the guy is a terrorist or something, but I'd rather think that, if I were a terrorist, my first instinct would not be to rush onto ET and start pasting my emails for everyone to see.
(More to the point, if I was the the FBI or the Department of Homeland Security, my crafty sting operation would not involve mysterious statements and overt hostility.)
It's just sad that so many posters have taken a stunning example of broker assholishness and disrespect and instead claimed that the trader must be hiding something because he didn't roll over and send/re-send all his credentials without explanation.
*I* would want an explanation, and no that doesn't make me a criminal. Even if I were a criminal, IB isn't the FBI. (If the IB thinks that this is a job for the FBI or DoHS, maybe they should call them instead of being deliberately mysterious and rude and insulting to a paying customer.)
Quote from FightTheFuture:
I did not question why, I just complied. Everyone has to comply, there are no exceptions, no special people.
Everyone "has to" comply with the whims of a for-profit corporation? For the love of all that's holy... why?
Good lord. I'm no bleeding heart liberal (anti-abortion, anti-gun control, pro-states' rights, anti-welfare, and to a large extent pro-racial profiling) but what you're implying isn't patriotism at all... it's fascism. Hell, it's not even fascism, because that would imply some kind of direct governmental oversight.
IB is not a governmental agency. If IB does not have a legal reason (such as: "In order to comply with paragraphs blahblahblah of the Patriot Act"), no one "has to" do anything.
For example: in absence of a specific legal statute, Sivashad doesn't "have to" jump through extra hoops just to access his own assets, nor does IB "have to" act like a jackass and abuse its own customers.
Disclaimer: This is, of course, still very much a one-sided story. The point of this post was not to say that I believe Sivashad's claims absolutely; rather, in the absence of additional information, I see absolutely no reason to believe that Sivashad has done anything wrong and I fully understand his desire for additional information before complying with IB's request.
Quote from LodeRunner:
Everyone "has to" comply with the whims of a for-profit corporation? For the love of all that's holy... why?
Every time I conduct business at my local bank, on a whim, my bank asks and I must comply and present ID.
I was refused a specific service at my local bank 1.5 years ago. No explanation, they would not answer me, nor even look at me. I did not do anything wrong, I'm totally innocent, blah, blah. I knew that they have and would comply with requests for the same service for other customers. Nowhere in their company policy did it state that they could deny me my rights!
They didn't like the way I looked, or maybe it had something to do with the Patriot Act! I'm a victim too! So instead of taking away the rights of other customers by wasting their time waiting in line and waiting for me, I went to my other bank more than 25 miles away.
Ideally I should have closed my account and taken my business to a local competitor of my bank. If enough people close their accounts for poor service, they will go out of business or improve their service.
Or should I have kept pestering my local bank for months for explanations on why they refused to act until they got sick of me and closed my account so I could claim being the victim of a big, bad corporation?
No way in hell would I want to run a business today having to deal with customers trying to circumvent MY COMPANY'S POLICY.
Don't you think the courteous and civil thing to do would be to actually tell your clients what your policies are?
Oh well, guess I'm just old-fashioned like that.
Oh well, guess I'm just old-fashioned like that.
There are legitimate reasons why a fraud prevention unit can't explain what you did that caused your account to be red-flagged - making that information available reduces its future effectiveness. E.g. if doing X causes a flag to get raised a malicious person will be sure to not do X to fly under their radar.Quote from LodeRunner:
Don't you think the courteous and civil thing to do would be to actually tell your clients what your policies are?
Its interesting that this is an IRA account, if the OP doesn't transfer this and ends up getting a check mailed/wired to him then he could end up with a mess on his hands.
Quote from sivashad:
Your IRA account must close IMMEDIATELY.
Quote from LodeRunner:
IB isn't the FBI. (If the IB thinks that this is a job for the FBI or DoHS,
Why would IB want FBI or DoHS snooping through some files that belong to IB?
FBI wouldn't stop just with one account and IB would have to dedicate someone full time at their cost to serve FBI's needs, answering questions, providing multiple copies and so on.
I am not a US born citizen and IB's act doesn't scare me a bit.
I don't know the gritty details of the banking laws in this country, but if IB seriously suspects that a crime (such as fraud) has been committed, it should report the situation to the proper authorities.
An analogy: A person walks into a restaurant and asks to be seated. (If you wish, the person can be of Southeast Asian descent or a member of some other stereotyped group.) The maître d' comes over and informs the person that he is not welcome in their establishment. When asked for details, the maître d' only makes some vague mention of "information" they'd received. The customer asks for an explanation, only to be refused, verbally abused, and asked to leave the premises at once. On the way out, when the guy tries to get his car from the valet, they refuse to do so unless he produces his driver's license and passport.
The point is, if the "information" IB received was so damning, the authorities should have been contacted.
Assuming the authorities have not been contacted (and assuming that Sivashad isn't concealing any important facets of this story), they are simply acting like colossal assholes.
It could be that banking regulations forces them to act like assholes, but if that were the case I would have expected a direct citation of the applicable regulation (at least, that's what I usually see) and I would have expected less overt hostility / more professionalism.
An analogy: A person walks into a restaurant and asks to be seated. (If you wish, the person can be of Southeast Asian descent or a member of some other stereotyped group.) The maître d' comes over and informs the person that he is not welcome in their establishment. When asked for details, the maître d' only makes some vague mention of "information" they'd received. The customer asks for an explanation, only to be refused, verbally abused, and asked to leave the premises at once. On the way out, when the guy tries to get his car from the valet, they refuse to do so unless he produces his driver's license and passport.
The point is, if the "information" IB received was so damning, the authorities should have been contacted.
Assuming the authorities have not been contacted (and assuming that Sivashad isn't concealing any important facets of this story), they are simply acting like colossal assholes.
It could be that banking regulations forces them to act like assholes, but if that were the case I would have expected a direct citation of the applicable regulation (at least, that's what I usually see) and I would have expected less overt hostility / more professionalism.
Something doesn't have to rise to the level of being illegal for IB to want to terminate their relationship with you.Quote from LodeRunner:
I don't know the gritty details of the banking laws in this country, but if IB seriously suspects that a crime (such as fraud) has been committed, it should report the situation to the proper authorities.
There is no inalienable right to a IB account or an explanation on why your account is being closed. Yes, it may be viewed as poor customer service - hardly a first for IB.
I would be unhappy if it were me but I suspect that the OP has some details that he is not sharing.
Let's continue this "what if" game.
What if sivashad is not a real sivashad (what if real sivashad passed away), there is no criminal in this, is it?
Now one of sivashad's kin is trying to get cash that doesn't belong to him/her (maybe other family members do not know about existence of IB accounts).
What if sivashad is not a real sivashad (what if real sivashad passed away), there is no criminal in this, is it?
Now one of sivashad's kin is trying to get cash that doesn't belong to him/her (maybe other family members do not know about existence of IB accounts).