I'd like to start a long flaming thread about IB's customer service that would create such a big stink, that they would actually improve it a bit -- But that probably wouldn't be productive. But what really matters is this: When there is a real problem, such as unable to access the system, unable to get an important order submitted, etc., how do they respond? I haven't had a real reason to call about anything, but the email responses I've received haven't inspired much confidence. Emails are all responded to in a timely manner and are sometimes informative. But the problem is that the email reponses usually seem like they were written in a way that allows the writer the minimum possible work in order to get me to go away. The other issue is that most times I have not received a followup, after having been told "I don't know - let me check into that". I don't really mean to flame, and most of the support emails I've sent have not been big enough issues to make a big issue about. So back to the real question: How does IB respond when it really matters?
I've basically come to the conclusion that IB support has serious issues, but I'm willing to deal with it because of IB's excellent commissions and platform. I always enter a stop in all my positions, just as protection in case the IB connection goes down, since very rarely does the IB stops not work. If you need to contact support, never use the online chat, they put the worst of their staff on this. Rather, call them and sometimes you will get someone knowledgable, if not, hang up and call again and hope you get someone else. Of couse there will be times when IB goes down, and all their phone lines get swamped, but thats part of the package.
Perhaps they should raise commission levels for phone in orders to justify hiring some additional staff for takin phone in orders. I'd rather pay an extra charge in a pinch than lose a ton because I couldn't get my trade in.
I've called the european helpdesk a few times, and i found them very helpful. But to protect myself i also enter a stop in my position, like Htrader. Despite the critical notes on this forum i think IB is the best, especially for us european traders. The banks and brokers in europe are living in the 80's. Observer
Perhaps they should raise commission levels for phone in orders to justify hiring some additional staff for takin phone in orders. IB already does this. It costs you an extra $25 per position when you call in to go flat on existing positions. Of course, the last time that their connection to Globex went down they couldn't get me flat, and this was after 45 minutes before I got through to the order desk. I called in on two different lines to "improve" my chances in the queue, and it still took 45 minutes. I made a big stink about it, but basically you have to accept the fact that IB support sucks if something does go wrong. It goes with the territory for their platform and cheap rates. BTW, I couldn't even offset my positions with another broker b/c IB could not confirm if I was net long or short, of if any of my pending stop orders would be executed (the market had traded to my price after IB's connection to Globex went down). And I won't even go into details of the after-the-market fills after their connection to Globex went back up and after people made adjustments to their positions thinking they had up-to-date executions.
"IB already does this. It costs you an extra $25 per position when you call in to go flat on existing positions" So let them raise it to $100 + bucks. Far less than losing $1,000's on a trade. And IB is down so rarely it wouldn't effect your P/L over the year. Perhaps this could be offered as a premium service to clients who understand the necessity and are willing to pay for the backup.
As I said before, I don't think phone orders are a good option during the times a broker is down. Especially if it's an online broker. It's much more efficient to have a second web site with completely separate systems. Of course in IB's case, even that shouldn't be necessary, the IB client should be able to switch to backup servers automatically. There is really no reason why it should not be possible to set up a system that is fail-proof (or close to it.) It might of course be too expensive, it might just be cheaper to lose a few clients every time the system goes down. A trading desk that takes phone orders will always be useless when the broker goes down. This is particularly true for direct access brokers, since a lot (if not most) of the customers will become aware of the problem and will call the desk within a short time period. This would mean that to be able to respond quickly, the trading desk staff would have to be equal to something like 1/5th of the number of active customers. Either the charge would have to be much more than $100, or outages would have to happen frequently. Besides, I think def said that the IB trading desk uses TWS, so if our clients aren't working, theirs probably aren't either. A phone order desk is only good for the times your computer crashes. voodoo
. "Besides, I think def said that the IB trading desk uses TWS, so if our clients aren't working, theirs probably aren't either." So let them set up alternate order entry methods.