Charles Schwab
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Schwab Has a Few Wee Problems
Schwab makes it hard to find the number of the account. They only show the last few digits and the "Mo" barely visible at the right is not what one would suspect where the number is. A low IQ person designed this. Then if you type "fund account" anybody but the address to send a check comes up, which is not common sense. Moreover, they misspelled my name on my brokerage account and it was an obvious mistake that anybody with an average IQ would have caught. Then when I sent them a check to fund a Global account that I had opened ,they deposited the check in the regular account instead of the Global account. Each generation is getting more and more incompetent. I called and let them know and there was a part of the account that still had my name misspelled on a more obscure part of the account. Moreover, they charge ridiculously high prices (19 Euros to trade one share, staggering GREED!), for foreign stocks on their "Global" account compared to their competitor, who charges 100s% less, yes, multiples less. And their Global account is not well designed in the layout of functions is awful. The currency layout in the global account is not rational if you buy different currencies. The only good thing about Schwab is they do not require 2 factor authentication (which is not 100% foolproof) requiring an advanced cell phone to open an account, which their competitor foolishly requires. And the worst thing of all is that their Global account is very hard to use. A complete low IQ person designed it. They have multiple quote boxes on the screen. When you put in the name of an equity in the search box at the bottom, it is not even for the Global account just loaded, but for the main account. This means you get an error message from the main account, which is asinine. The actual functioning search box is several tabs away which is ridiculous. The stock symbol box is supposed to autopopulate with the name of the equity being spelled out in the box which it does not do. They literally did not have enough intelligence to copy their competitors' basic features. You have to literally know the stock symbol beforehand instead of the name of the company, which is asinine and illogical. All this is because their competitor, ########### ####### is an elitist brokerage and requires an expensive Iphone style phone and 2 factor authentication which excludes huge swathes of the population. Worst of all there is no breakdown of currencies. I forgot to mention the mediocre customer service as their customer support phone reps have poor social skills most of the time. And they do not have access to all major EU markets, which is ridiculous. What a massive disappointment. Their platform is a disaster but the best option so far which is not saying much.