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ib's margin rates incredibly low
- Thread starter joeyata1
- Start date
No, my IB issues are still unresolved. I am still with IB because I have some long-term trades going on. Just as soon as I close those trades, I may change brokers.Quote from traderNik:
Hi cscott
There are quite a few accusations going on here! Out of your total of 33 posts, how many of them have to do, either directly or indirectly, with IB? This is an honest question, I have never seen your username until tonight.
I noticed on the fiirst thread you started that two IB guys came on and offered personal help - did you manage to get your issues resolved?
Re: the call to Switzerland, that is a bit strange. I would have thought they would offer to call you. They pay next to nothing for LD anyway, compared to the cost of having a live person spend time personally troubleshooting your problem.
The last question I would have is this. You seem to be having huge, ongoing problems at IB. Why are you still there?
Thanks, Nik
Further, to me, IB is like a person that does not realize his full potential and is self-destructive. I want IB to get better. I post my problems at IB in hopes that they will attempt to improve in certain areas if they see enough complaints. I feel they have the potential for being the best broker out there, but because of their direction (or lack of direction) in certain areas, such as not thoroughly testing their trading platform before its release, they are hurting themselves. If IB (interactivebrokers) made a few policy changes, I'm convinced they would cut down customer complaints over 75%, and their business would increase substantially.
Are you sure it is that cheap from the U.S.? I have long distance blocked on my home phone, so I assumed that I would have to use my cellphone (don't want to use Skype). I can't imagine how high the rate would be to call overseas on my cellphone. Still, I don't think it is right for IB to expect its customers to have to call overseas for attention to an immediate problem, especially when they receive hundreds of dollars in commisions alone from me every month.Quote from zdreg:
get yourself a telephone calling card. can you afford a .03 to .06 per minute charge?
eg. .05 not .005 which is your commission charge.
Quote from risk1:
Hello, cscott
It would be helpful if we could learn from your experience. Can you possibly say a bit more about the issue you were trying to resolve?
Cheers.
He stated that he was having connectivity issues with TWS, connectivity issues with IB customer service, and incorrect account balances.
The first issue is unique to him. As he states in on of his first threads, "TWS goes out more than a Vegas showgirl." Generally when IB has connectivity issue with their platform, 25%-50% or more of their customers experience it simultaneously. In fact, the issue is reported on their website and they usually have it fixed in a matter of minutes. At worse an hour. But it is a rare thing. I haven't been down since April. And that was for 10 mins. But they do have back up which I am able to acces in the event that I need to enter/exit/modify an order. It's their HTML webtrader.
This is reason one why many here have been harsh with Cscott. He wants IB to solve a problem which is not on their end.
The second problem he has is connectivity to IB Customer service. He essentially wants one ring - pick up - no hold. Which does happen from time to time even during RTH in the US, but is not the norm. Trouble ticket reply time can be a bit slow too depending on the situation. High priority issues tend to be addressed quickly. Low priority "inquiries" will take a few hours or at worse, days. But Cscott wan't all his issues and inquiries answered immediately. Sure it'd be nice. But then that's the purview of full service brokers. You know, the one's you pay exrbitant commission to. I've had one once and found it just wasn't worth it. As you gain experience and know how to anticapate problems and address your own concerns(very good to superior network connectivity and networking knowledge), you don't need instant service. Trade issues? Double check your orders before you send. If need of a bust, know the exchange bust rules. As long as you contact your broker within the exchanges time frame, even if that means holding a few moments/minutes, everything will be all right. Also, you need to understand how trades are executed so you don't go crying to your broker unnecessarily. One's ingnorance in this deaprtment will have one looking for a broker every few months.
His last issue is highly suspect as it is an issue not reported nor widely experienced by many customers and may suggest that Cscott doesn't know how to interrogate how IB reports RT account information. You never hear of daytraders, ones who need accurate RT account information complaining of inaccuracies. I know, I have never had an issue in this area. The one issue I had which may have been somewhat similiar was in how IB sweeps foriegn currency balances. But it was fully and couretously explained to me by an IB rep via a trouble ticket.
Sure, we all want IB to improve even though it is pretty much the Gold standard in retail brokerages. Only those traders who have been trading for at least a decade and having gone through some of the best and worst brokerages during that time would appreciate that. Not that new traders can't. It's just that new traders tend to have unrealistic expectations and have never dealt with a quasi-professional brokerage before. Let alone a pro brokerage. An industry fact is that the higher up you go in retail, the less hand holding you're going to get. When you reach professional, there is no hand holding. Meaning, the onus of problem solving falls on the client. And that's because the higher up you go in retail, the more likely trading is a business for you and not a hobby or sideline endeavor.
Quote from cscott:
Are you sure it is that cheap from the U.S.? I have long distance blocked on my home phone, so I assumed that I would have to use my cellphone (don't want to use Skype). I can't imagine how high the rate would be to call overseas on my cellphone. Still, I don't think it is right for IB to expect its customers to have to call overseas for attention to an immediate problem, especially when they receive hundreds of dollars in commisions alone from me every month.
yes. rates under certain circumstances can even be less than .01./minute.
reality.
hundreds of dollars of commissions per month is not much. suppose for a moment you generated $800/month in commissions how much could come down the bottom line.. that is $40/day in commissions. ihow much do you think is left over after expenses.
if you start to figure in what $800/month customers cost in customer service time these kind of accounts are almost guranteed to be money losers,
Quote from cscott:
No, my IB issues are still unresolved. I am still with IB because I have some long-term trades going on. Just as soon as I close those trades, I may change brokers.
If I had one tenth of the grief you claim to have had from IB (and I haven't in nearly 8 years with them) I would cheefully roll my trades from IB to another broker.
In fact, when I think about it, I can't believe you. If you hate IB so much then the cost of commissions to reopen the positions somewhere else is negligible. You have to be having us on cscott!
I was trying to close out a currency (Ideal) position, and couldn't get it closed out, so by the time I waited for online chat to answer (15 min) and another 20-25 min. for them to help me close it out (around 45 mins. total), I had lost money. I finally asked the IB chat rep if he could close the trade for me since I was having trouble. He stated that it would cost me extra for him to do it. I asked him if he could not charge me extra and just close it out, and he agreed and finally closed the trade for me, and I appreciate him doing that. Because it took so long to close out the trade, I asked him for a refund of the money I lost during that time (the last 45 mins). His answer was "that is impossible."Quote from risk1:
Hello, cscott
It would be helpful if we could learn from your experience. Can you possibly say a bit more about the issue you were trying to resolve?
Cheers.
The trade was losing money so I wanted to close it, and in the 45 mins it took to close it, I lost more money, (I was only asking for a credit of the money lost during the 45 mins if took to close the trade). I prefer not to disclose the amount of loss.Quote from risk1:
Hello, cscott
Sorry but I'm not with you. How did you manage to lose money? Would you mind giving an indication of the magnitude of your loss?
Cheers.
I will tell you abit more about the problem, though. When I asked the IB chat rep why a credit was "impossible", he stated "because how to close a trade is listed on our website or trading manual." Yes, it is, and I think I know how to close a trade, as I've being doing awhile. However, I did not even realize that I had forex trades open until I saw my account balance falling. I tried a forex trade earlier that day, and thought I closed it out. I assumed it was closed since it did not show up on TWS(see below).
The following things contributed to this which I believe are IB's fault. I later found out that:
1. Forex trades from Ideal do not show on TWS (IB's trading platform) and the "Close All Positions" will not close them either.
2. Forex trades do not show in open positions in account view or executions
3. The "Close All Non-Based U.S. Positions" found in the Account View window doesn't always work either.
If the above worked like they were supposed to, I would have been aware of the forex position and closed it out immediately without ever needing customer service.
The IB chat rep also stated that I should have known that I had an open position by looking at my account statement. Yet, account statements are only finalized once a day.