Emergency Backup Plan

I humbly submit this as a lesson in what to think about / plan for – in hopes it may help someone down the road


Mods – My first thread so if I placed it in the wrong category – apologies – please move it accordingly



Today I’m in a decent size long position, and at ~ 2:00 PM EST the platform dies. (broker later told me they lost the data feed)

I think no problem, position was green so I’ll phone the broker and exit the position – as I have an emergency plan with a contact number to the trading desk for just such situations.


I call the emergency trading desk number – it’s disconnected

I call my representative – he’s not answering

I log onto the broker’s web site to get a contact number – web site down

I log into my email to get another contact number – 1st number no one answers, 2nd number answering machine answers with “We’re experiencing problems and will have the network back up momentarily” – yea no kidding


I wait through the answering machine and finally get a person – and have them exit the position


Moral of the story

I would respectfully suggest –

Having an emergency contingency plan with contact numbers – AND – Verify the damn thing periodically

Going into my business plan tonight is a rule governing the verification of all contact numbers and names every quarter


Maybe this is common sense – but I never thought of it till today

Regards
Redneck

 

how did the trade turn out? either way, this is an eye-opener.

 

Is this a function of the broker...? It's hard to imagine a "major" retail broker being so difficult to reach, but I'd certainly like to know if that's not the case.

 

Some guys who have enough funds like to have an account at another brokerage so they can put a hedge on.

 

Trading leveraged with real size without a backup account is an accident waiting to happen.

 

Auspiv

Thanks for asking – Everything turned out well as the position was immediately terminated over the phone

(just took three phone calls too many, and chasing down a number which should have been readily available, and accurate – per my emergency backup plan)


I amended my business plan last night, verified all numbers and names today, along with some other information.




Heech

Tradient (formerly Terra Nova) – not sure where they rank among the rest…

Platform locked up again today – but only for a couple of minutes - yee haa



Trendo

Good point –I’m just trying to give folks something to postulate. (You know the watch out for minefields – or they may just blow your butt up)


Sculptor66

Another Good point – I would say leveraged or not.... After all money is money



Thanks all

Redneck

 

You’re an excellent businessman and trader Redneck.

Many of us have similar stories.

In my case it was both hard drives on my new Dell PC blew out about 6 months apart (this was 4 years ago). My system backups restored the configuration and the backup PC saved the trades both times. The backups were done using Acronis True Image of the hard drive.

Disaster planning is essential to a good business plan.