Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Non-Tech : The Critical Investing Workshop -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Clappy who wrote (11231)	4/5/2000 8:22:00 PM
From: Dealer	Respond to of 35685

Hi Clappy! To bad you can't get everything someplace. Someone came on here and said they always kept 2 accounts just in case they ahd a problem with one. You know the hassle when opening an account. I took them up on it and here my brokerage houses and what I think: Brown: good service but no frills. You are really on your own. Accutrade: Took an order on PC 25 minutes to update.....has all the frills. Help some what. Very personal. Kind, I need that when they call with a margin call. TEE HEE! Fidelity: I hate fidelity. You are right takes them 3 or 4 day to update. Slow to get anything done. NDB: My IRA Been with them for long time just started trading on PC. Never had a problem...don't know about frills.

To: Clappy who wrote (11231)	4/5/2000 8:34:00 PM
From: freeus	Respond to of 35685

I switched my margin account from Fidelity to Brown. Fidelity was always changing maintenance without warning and causing me to have margin calls. Brown tells you way in advance if they are thinking of changing maintenance. Also Brown's site is faster than Fidelity's (I still have F for my IRA: they allow covered calls and options buying.) Datek was wonderful: I loved it, fast, inexpensive, clear...only problem was when I began options trading. If Datek really does decide to do options (and allows it in an IRA) I'd switch back. Freeus

To: Clappy who wrote (11231)	4/5/2000 8:45:00 PM
From: BRANDYBGOOD	Respond to of 35685

Hi Clappy! I'm new to posting on the porch but have lurked here from the inception. (sounds like a lab experiment) Anywhoo, I use DLJ as an online broker. They have a downloadable windows program called Marketspeed which is pretty good. They charge $19.95 per trade. The margin requirements vary depending on the stock and I don't think they allow you to margin any internutz. (though who does anymore? cept my buddy at morgan stanley on certain issues) They have realtime updates on account balances, they also e-mail you upon execution and have a seperate execution screen which is updated immediately. I really have never had a problem with them and they have all the bells and whistles. (even get a free subscription to that ass Kramer and to Briefing.com)Also trading options there is no problem at all. Just have to stipulate it on your agreement. After consulting w/ the grand master V today on cc's I saved my patootie on a margin call about 10 minutes before they went in and actually sold some of my shares of ELON! When I discovered what they had done I called them right up. Took me about 5 minutes to get through to them. They admitted their error and put the shares they sold back into my account! That's pretty good customer service if you ask me.I didn't have to beg for a big Kahuna supervisor or anything. They just put me on hold called the margin dept. and took care of it. They also don't mind answering any brain picking question you have. That's more than I can say for the anal Schwab where I used to have a seperate account. They were horrible. 2 years ago, I put in a market order for AMZN for 500 shares. They filled me 200 shares at X and then 300 shares at x+25. Wouldn't do a thing about it except say it was a fast market even though I faxed them a copy of the time and sales report. (like they're too stupid to pull it themselves) Never mind the down time on their crummy web site. Needless to say I told them BYE! and consolidated my acount to DLJ. Still have my MSDW acct, just pension etc. there though. Only trade a little there every now and again. Hope this helped you somewhat! Brandy