May 31 2007
Oh thy hassle
I need to sell and buy some stocks. Few clicks should accomplish the task, simple enough? No. Not with Citi culture: it took 13:47 minutes to execute just one transaction, costing me $35 commission on mere 200 shares. Ok, it’s a Jap stock, so the Citi website won’t take it, has to go thro the human broker (commission cost is equal on a click or speak, foreign or domestic). Would it be so hard for the Citi web designer to have our broker’s phone # pop up right there? Guess it is. Find my broker’s phone, a woman answered it, then she transferred me. I’ve never met my Citi broker, just recognize his attractive voice. I had to spell out the stock symbol, and was on hold and …. I’d rather do all of the above with few mouse clicks, done within few seconds. Oh Citi’s website simplified a bit lately, it used to be a different set of password to log in to equity trading, now it uses the same set as you log in to your account. The US stocks I was able to execute on the web, but there isn’t a Next button for more transactions. When will Citi spend money actually catching up with the rest of the industry? It charges so much for providing such user unfriendly service. Neat.