Hi there, I'd like to gather peoples experiences with IBs trouble ticket / inquiry system via the account management interface. I have had mixed experience with this system and think there is a serious flaw in it that IB is not choosing to respond to. Either because they do not know about it (because the system is flawed so they aren't alerted) or they are choosing to ignore it. The 'help' documentation for the system states one of the advantages of this system is: "Fast Response: Tickets will be assigned to an IB representative usually within a few minutes and always within 2 hours during European and North American trading hours. During Asian trading hours, response times may be longer." I currently have 2 open inquiries that remain unassigned. They are date/time stamped from 2007/06/08 04:06, and the other 2007/05/24 03:57. Clearly longer than 2 hours to be assigned in both cases. The companies size makes it nearly impossible to let them know of any major faults, or at least to let the right people know. Best regards, MK
MK, in my experience, it is mostly taking about 5 days to 5+ months to resolve the solvable tickets this year. It used to be a little better last year. Late replies are still better than no replies. But note that trouble ticket is not the only way to contact IB. IB chat and phone are other options. However, they may ask you to file a ticket anyway if the answer is not immediately available to the IB CSR. IB is not known for its customer services even if it is their issue. IB has other advantages.
Hi GTC, I certainly agree, IB has many advantages and I am happy with them for the most part. In my case, the tickets are not even being assigned, let alone resolved. Which to me would imply that no one has even looked at them. I'm pretty amazed you are experiencing 5 month delays on ticket resolution - wow! Sure hope they were not urgent. With kind regards, MK
Over past two months, from best to worst: Trade related issues (routing problems primarily) -- 4 data points -- 1 to 3 hr. Seems that once it says LVL1, it gets addressed. Of the 4 data points, only 1 response proved incorrect and had to go through another turn, with the combined time for both turns w/in 3 hrs) Market data issues -- 3 data points -- 2 hrs to ~9 hrs (end of same day for problem reported early morning). STP question -- 1 datum -- next morning Banking question -- 1 datum -- 2 days ACAT issue -- 1 datum -- 3 days TWS bug reports -- 2 data points -- no response but then again I stated that I wasn't expecting any and was just reporting the bugs for their info
IB's tech support seems to go on vacation for a few months at a time. Sal, IB's manager of technical support, will appear on ET, apologize for problems, and great response will ensue for about 3 weeks. Then, it's back to the usual lack of response. I have two tickets still open. One was opened 1/30/07, one 4/30/07. The former has level 1 responses along with a promise to "look into it further" (but no action in about 3 months aside from the occasional follow-up on my part demonstrating additional examples of the bug). The other hasn't even been assigned.
Last month, 3 problems and IB went 3 for 3 in fixing the issue quickly. However, I did not use the trouble ticket just the live chat. AAA30
Iam lucky so far so no serious errors had happened in IB execution in the last 18 months. 2 weeks ago I raised a ticket (not urgent) about if I am eligible for monthly dividend if I buy TLT on the last trading (not settlement )day of the month. It is still not assigned.!! In the last 18 months,I have sent a opening wire in to my a/c, transfered a big a/c from another broker,got out a small international bank transfer wire from my IB a/c to my bank-all with out a hitch. I trade atleast 30-50 times a day usually. If I really wanted a urgent reponse, I have to go to live chat repeatedly it seems! Passive problem ticket thro IB a/c management-weeks/months to get assigned /reply/solution. Sometimes the thought is scary.Guess I have no alternative right now.