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Sorry IB, your customer service is a joke
- Thread starter Shawn B.
- Start date
Quote from Shawn B.:
Update: I've installed the latest Java version, it still works as before
Since I've tried this on 3 different PCs I'd like to know if any of you has actually tried (and succeeded in) buying/selling an EFP..
And to all those who are bashing: what's a person to do?
I'm investing a good chunk of my savings in IB, the very least I expect is to be able to successfully use its features, but if I experience a totally clueless bug, and find no way for solving it anywhere, what should I do? Customer support didn't solve the problem, it gets frustrating when you're trying to invest your money and people push you back and forth in the chatrooms.
this was my only solution
Should I refrain from posting just because a couple of you like calling others noobs? No way..my money is more important, and besides that, at least in the future someone encountering the same bug will likely find it searching google
I have no idea what the reason is, but there are a group of people who at the first sight of something negative towards IB come in with the cannons blazing. Like they have never had a problem....
At any rate, here is a summary of my experiences, maybe this will help.
- Chat connects maybe %50 of the time. It's not an issue on my end, it's on theirs. They NEVER have a good explanation for it, other than "we are having issues with chat today".
- Bugs with them ALWAYS come down to one of three things. 1. the java version is incorrect. I keep mine updated, but the most recent one caused far more bugs than the older one, so I rolled back. 2. The IB version is incorrect. I keep mine updated, and that seems to work well. 3. It's a bug, they know about it and have no plans on fixing it... lol.
- Never had to phone them, the inquiry ticket system works for me, although it's taken up to 2 weeks for them to reply at times.
- realistically, they offer more products than any broker I know, and have relatively low commissions. For the benefit of this, I work around what I stated above. There are products and exchanges that I haven't been able to trade, even though I wanted to. Last year I could trade SFE for a looooonog time, finally gave up.
Like any company, they obviously have strength's and weaknesses. Customer service has not been a strength in my books.
TNG
Although I had only started to deal with them yesterday, I can already feel that they are totally fxxked up in CS. I called their Canada office, where I am opening an account, and NOOOOO one would pick up. So I called the US line, have the US person transfer me. Well, it is even worse talking after reaching their CS. They are rude, won't answer your question. Basically all he was saying is We can't help you, do it yourself. :eek: That stopped me on sending in my application
Quote from Shawn B.:
Update: I've installed the latest Java version, it still works as before
Since I've tried this on 3 different PCs I'd like to know if any of you has actually tried (and succeeded in) buying/selling an EFP..
And to all those who are bashing: what's a person to do?
I'm investing a good chunk of my savings in IB, the very least I expect is to be able to successfully use its features, but if I experience a totally clueless bug, and find no way for solving it anywhere, what should I do? Customer support didn't solve the problem, it gets frustrating when you're trying to invest your money and people push you back and forth in the chatrooms.
this was my only solution
Should I refrain from posting just because a couple of you like calling others noobs? No way..my money is more important, and besides that, at least in the future someone encountering the same bug will likely find it searching google
Well, it's unlikely that a trading forum is best-practice for getting a platform-problem vetted. I agree that you have reason to gripe, but aren't we talking about the bill-rate on 10k here? At what point does it become insignificant enough in $-terms to say, "phuck it"?
You can earn the bill-rate on the first $10k via the conversion, box or roll markets. Conversions/reversals are a 3-way; long[short] stock/short[long] synthetic stock. You can place the order as a unit through IB's spread/combo trader. You'll earn [nearly] the risk-free rate with a lower haircut. A liquid option series should beat the EFP by a few basis points.
Quote from atticus:
Well, it's unlikely that a trading forum is best-practice for getting a platform-problem vetted. I agree that you have reason to gripe, but aren't we talking about the bill-rate on 10k here? At what point does it become insignificant enough in $-terms to say, "phuck it"?
You can earn the bill-rate on the first $10k via the conversion, box or roll markets. Conversions/reversals are a 3-way; long[short] stock/short[long] synthetic stock. You can place the order as a unit through IB's spread/combo trader. You'll earn [nearly] the risk-free rate with a lower haircut. A liquid option series should beat the EFP by a few basis points.
Can you give an example of the liquid options and how much yield are u getting? I looked at the Q's and the bid/ask spread is at least 3 cents on the synethetic options leg. Also, u will be charged 3 leg of commision instead of just the 0.50 cents for EFP. Can you post an actual example of how the options way can earn you more moeny than the EFP way? Thanks!
Doing that with a conversion would be nice, in theory, the problem is putting it into practice
I.e. choosing different strike prices for the synthetic greatly affects the whole trade
For example if you try using a 70 strike price synthetic on QQQ you would only get like 30$ of interest in a year on 10000$, but choosing a different strike yields much different results
This effectively makes it necessary to have some sort of scanning tool to scan all the possible conversion combinations, much like the EFP market scanner, cause you risk locking in rates of interest as low as 0.1% from what I've seen
Does anybody know of a way to scan all those combinations and pick the best implied interest?
I.e. choosing different strike prices for the synthetic greatly affects the whole trade
For example if you try using a 70 strike price synthetic on QQQ you would only get like 30$ of interest in a year on 10000$, but choosing a different strike yields much different results
This effectively makes it necessary to have some sort of scanning tool to scan all the possible conversion combinations, much like the EFP market scanner, cause you risk locking in rates of interest as low as 0.1% from what I've seen
Does anybody know of a way to scan all those combinations and pick the best implied interest?
IB is great when you have no problem. When there is a problem you are on your old. They have no customer services whatsoever.
The ticket system is a joke. I have ticket up for months, and no answer. Then I decided to close my account with them.
The rep on phone call is rude. They rush to hang up on you. It could be he is the only one answering the phone.
Of course, I can only speak from my experiences.
The ticket system is a joke. I have ticket up for months, and no answer. Then I decided to close my account with them.
The rep on phone call is rude. They rush to hang up on you. It could be he is the only one answering the phone.
Of course, I can only speak from my experiences.
Any one has experience with their API? if they have slow support for their trading platform I wonder what happen if you are writing your own app and run into problems.. lights out?
Quote from shadowwarrior:
Any one has experience with their API? if they have slow support for their trading platform I wonder what happen if you are writing your own app and run into problems.. lights out?
Their API is horribly documented (imho) and the only support that I'm aware of is a really user-unfriendly forum on their site. Having said that, however, it's not really that hard to figure it out if you have experience.
TNG