IB disastrous IT service these last days

Investing / Brokers
1

Hi,

I opened an account with IB following some recommendations (from this forum and other friends) but I have to say I’m very disappointed.

Today is the second day in a row that when I connect to the platform I don’t have access to the trading options. That means if I want to put or cancel an order I cannot…

Then after a while a pop-up appears saying “Login failed - You have been locked out due to an excessive number of failed login attempts”.

I’m an IT developer myself and I can guess the issue is that upon connecting to the platform they try to open a web socket with the trading system and since it’s so overloaded it ends up locking the account (without the final user doing anything)

Yesterday I spent on the phone 30 mins to get somebody to “fix” this. Today my account is locked again and it’s taking more than 1 hour to get somebody to do anything.

I know shit happens but this really looks very amateurish and I get to wonder whether my money is safe with them.

Do you guys have also issues like this as well?

Kind regards,

Javier

2 Likes
2

I’m using it almost every weekday. Never had a single problem other than maybe a maintenance window.

3

I only know that e.g. DKB in Germany does not allow you to buy at all currently (at least this morning) due to ‘technical difficulties’, so it does not seem to be limited to IB.
Probably too many people selling/buying currently due to the whole Coronavirus situation.

4

I have lots of problems like you described with the platforms. Specially the Portal :frowning:
I’ve been asking around (forum, friends, etc) and specially the US clients didn’t have any problem and lots of europeans neither.

I’m also in IT… I tried Mac, Windows, Chrome, Firefox, At work, at home… always the same.
I’m starting to thing that “some” accounts we are routed to some server/system that is not performance at all or some strange thing.

It’s not normal that we have slow interfaces, problems and everybody else are perfect.

Just for info, after login, sometimes takes me around 3 minutes to have the data in the screen. Always take more than one minute. Sometimes I have to reload the page several times…

I opened some tickets, I did even some videos to show the problem!! Nothing has been solved.

I notice that we are routed to UK instead of EU or COM … I don’t know if that could be the problem.

Regards.

5

I warned about it - it will take days if not a whole week to get approved for options trading. You had to start earlier! Now the volatility shot up through the roof…

Regarding not getting approved for options at IB - apparently you have to tell them you “have” multiple years of experience with options and >100 trades to get that permission.

I don’t have the problem with logouts that you’re having.

6

Well, I opened my account like more than a year ago.

By not having access to the “trading options” I meant the trading functionality in general: buy/ sells… nothing to do with option orders.

7

Dude you clearly were talking about trading options and puts. If not then for an IT guy you’re surprisingly unprecise in your writing.

8

No, all I wanted to say is that I couldn’t do any trading at all.

You can take my writing above as a product of frustration.

9

I use IB veeery sparingly but enough to notice the quirky behaviour of the client portal. First, during login it sometimes just says login failed when I clearly put the right password. Or I click the login button and nothing happens. And then, in the client portal, it seems to load the layout, and separately loads the content. So for example, you see your portfolio page, and oh you have $0, but wait, a few seconds later comes the chart and all the data, and you also have a notification. I guess this happens because I’m connected to a slow server.

10

For me the same. Luckily I just need to login once per month.

Imagine beging a daytrader with this platform, lol.

11

I think pros use the thick client, the Trading Workstation app. Maybe it connects to a different server and they take care that it performs well.

But anyway, you get what you pay for. You know, I wouldn’t mind to pay 5-10x more than IB, if only I had the same flexibility that they offer with regards to exchanging currency and topping up / paying out in so many currencies.

12

That’s exactly what came to mind when I bumped into so many technical issues.

My thinking had always been that IB was a very solid/ robust platform with not so good UX. It seems I was wrong…

Thanks god I trade very occasionally.

1 Like
13

Same for me. Never had an issue with IB in one year.

14

I used the IB app on my smart phone - works very well - because I also had problems with logging in & loading on my computer.

15

I read it as “the options for trading”, as the program options. :slight_smile:

16

I had exactly the same Thursday afternoon. No trading rights & your pop up. 20 minutes waiting on the phone followed by 20 minutes trouble-shooting. He unlocked my account. Was told to try TWS instead of Portal or another browser or phone app if problem in future. Seems a bit unlogical if it says account is locked, but I suppose I’ll try next time.

1 Like
17

For me:

TWS works well… Just some small problems with the java stuff… e.g. The cross in the graphs is displaced from there the mouse is and small things like that. Sometimes missing data, or watchlists, etc.

With the mobile app, no problems at all. Always quick and acurate. Just, I don’t like to operate with a phone… just that. I used some times for some money exchange and always to check the market when I’m on the go.

Is just the portal web that is a mess.

The cheap prices doesn’t justify all those errors. I have another accounts where are mostly free and they are working perfectly.