Questrade Reviews 404

The platform itself is good but the back office is horrible. They will tell you everything is good to go, then another person will tell you they need something else. it took me 4 weeks and hours of calls to get my account opened and 5-7 times submitting & resubmitting forms that were already submitted (correctly). It's as though it's your first time ever contacting them each and every time you reach out. Absolutely brutal. Find another platform.

I have used Questrade for the last 4 years, and thought it seemed a rather smooth and simple trading experience. I made a large initial investment/deposit, and have periodically added funds, though have not sold many holdings. I have since found the platform to be rather predatory in regards to display and receivership of interest and margin account policies. I have a margin account, though ensured I always had adequate funds in the account as to never borrow or leverage my investment. Over the years I kept finding my cash amount seemed to drop and at times go into the negative. Both the app and website are set to show your "combined amount in CAD" The next option is to show your "combined in USD" There is 2 options you can click further over that simply say CAD or USD. I had always had a positive value showing in the first 2 options, and had never clicked the simple CAD or USD options. In spite of this, I was continually being charged interest. I would put a thousand dollars into my account to ensure this would not happen again. I would check my combined cash in CAD or combined cash in USD and would see a large positive balance, so left my account to grow and pay dividends over the last year. Upon logging in today, I found I again had a negative balance in spite having left it with more than 1 thousand dollars cash a year ago. Transaction history showed I had been paying approximately $200USD a month in interest. I could not figure out why this was happening. After calling in again I learned that my deposits had been in CAD, where as I had bought stocks in USD. I actually had more than $26,000CAD in my account, but had an even greater USD negative balance. In a margin with Questrade account the USD negative balance is held separately and interest had been being charged for the last 4 years, compounding monthly at a predatory 18% rate, though in the same account Questrade held $26000CAD, and in both options to look at combined CAD or combined USD it showed a positive cash balance. I never received any email, letter, message, or call about this. I will be closing all Questrade accounts, and feel like this policy of CAD and USD holdings being completely separate should be much more easy to see and understand.

When you complete a trade to buy an investment the funds from your account are removed instantly. However, when there is dividend paid on existing holdings they are very slow in depositing the dividends/cash to your account, I assume they are investing my dividends in a short term investment vehicle . When you reach out to the customer service team they give some bogus excuse that they have to validate the pay out. Don't believe them??

Stay far away from Questrade, they are very overpriced charging trading fees of 11.95 us dollars for a credit spread and calls, puts. Advance trades cost 15.95 (iron, butterfly, etc). Also, you have to pay to close your trades at the same price. They have terrible fees just to day trade. 4.95 us to buy shares remember when you close the trade its 4.95 again to close it. If they want people to stay, charge less on fees. Yes they will answer questions fast but they will not change their overpriced fees. Go to MOOMOO or WEbull which are a lot cheaper. Trading is about making money, NOT getting robbed by your Broker. One other thing: the market opens 7:30am in Calgary but you can't trade until 7:45, if you need to close a trade right away you will not be able to and this may cause you to lose money. It's already hard enough for a retail trader in this game, therefore losing another 15 min can be detrimental. Trust me I have lost hundreds of dollars in the first 15 min of the opening market. This is BS Questrade, do better. Retailers are already at a disadvantage due to not being able to play the before and after market plus hedge fund insider trading going on. You need to change your fees plus time and let the retailer investor have a fighting chance.

I have been using questrade for many years now. I have transferred a few accounts there and I like having everything consolidated. For non-residents it's a good place to keep your TFSA since they will give the tax receipt you need.
Their customer service is quick to respond. I have never had an issue. I plan on using Questrade for all my trading needs in the future.

Service is awful. Transactions are always complicated. Charged me $150 to ge tmy money out. Hidden costs everywhere. Stay away.

I'll tell you why they have such a low rating. I've had a self-directed account for a few years now and quite happy with the platform as a trading tool. Then I received a physical stock certificate as partial compensation for work I had done for a traded company, so I went on to their website to see what I needed to do to fund my account with the physical stock. It was simple to find - simply sign the back and send it into out offices via courier, or come down to the office in Toronto and submit it there. So I decided it would be worth the drive to take care of this investment asap.
After driving 90 minutes I arrived at the offices and was greeted by three smiling associates that proceed to tell me that they no longer accept physical stock certificates. They even suggested that I was wrong - it says right on the website that they no longer accept stock certificates. I was asked to have a seat as I was now completely frustrated with the lack of simple problem solving going on here. The "New Accounts Rep", then came over with his laptop to show me that the website said they can't accept stock, so I proceeded to show him where it DOES say, "simply drop off the certificate... fee of $300, 10-15 days, etc, etc." Their response? "Well it says we don't take it on other parts of the website..." Now, I'm pissed.
I've taken 3 hours of my day to come and do what your own website says I have to to get this done. I'm told I'm wrong, sorry you wasted your time, and there is nobody, or nothing we can do to change it. Can't a reasonable person expect that a finance company's website is kept up to date when it comes to something as important as funding your account? Well they didn't, they don't, and I wouldn't trust my money with a company that puts zero effort into customer care. I am actively looking to move my account to a company that at least backs up what it says in public. Save your money. To coin their phrase - It's Time To Switch.

I am an older retired investor and moved my money to Questrade for the income generating stage of a portfolio lifecycle. I am now moving all of my wife’s and my accounts back to the brokerage I left after 2 years of frustration, withdrawal fees, a platform that hardly works and an IT support team that has only two solutions to every problem…. Try turning your computer on and off ( what? Are we in elementary school?) or Try switching browsers ( really? You are a specialist Online Brokerage and only some browsers work with your platform?) neither of which help in the least.
If you love Chatbots and canned email responses to help inquires, love to be left on hold or be spontaneously logged out of the platform while you are using it, then Questrade is for you.
Case in point is the canned reply to my review. See Malcolm’s review of March 4 2024 and the identical Questrade response.
In the end this review did elicit a call from Questrade offering any help I needed. Sadly it was too little too late as I have move our money to another brokerage. To be clear though, the patient woman in the other end of the phone really had nothing to offer my litany of complaints you see above other than silence and sympathy. Nothing has changed folks. My opinion of Questrade as a bumbling semi functional brokerage remains the same. Don’t invest with them. And if you are, move. It’s not as hard as you think.

I invested #10,000 in low risk TFSA which even I na standard bank would have accrued interest over 2 years. I never made any interest or investment returns on the TFSA over 2-3 years and finally got out (even though it took 3-4 months even to withdraw my money which of course, according to them was "lower",than the amount I first tried to withdraw due to their incompetence to simply close my account. I should have simply put my money in TFS in a normal bank!

I tried to transfer money into my questrade account and they demanded that I provide the details of the bank that the money was being transfered from.

They don't have that right. I'm not sending them statements or corporation docs for a company that isn't registered with questrade.

Then when you question them, they say for privacy reasons it can only be discussed in certain ways and criteria must be met.

VERY UNETHICAL, and making unreasonable demands. Stay away.

Platform is ok. Used it for years without problems.

Problems started when trying to close accounts. An account closure has been 'in process' for 2.5 months! How?!?! Opening an account takes 5 days, yet closing is impossible.

Management needs to take their 'active' account KPIs and shove them where the sun don't shine, and close people's accounts as requested! Insane.

Transactions/Activities on a Friday are not shown until the next business day. Many people like to access their accounts on the weekend, to see how things went for the week. Strange part is that the Cash Data is updated, but the Activity data isn't.
The screen time-out is too too short (seems about 5-6 minutes), almost impossible to step away from one's computer to make a cup of coffee or to use a biological break without having to re-sign in. A nuisance. Suggest 30 minutes. TD Direct is over an hour.

Don't sign up with them if you are looking to do option trading. There fees are overpriced. If you win the trade, they take all your profits because of the fees. I did 1 share of spy Butteryfly call $14.95 to entry the trade plus $1 per share, then exited the trade $14.95 exit plus $1 per share. my profits, should have been $300. Instead with all their fees. I was $-10.

Terrible experience with customer service! For the past month, I've been attempting to transfer my RSP and my daughter's RESP from another broker to Questrade, but there's been no progress. Despite sending numerous emails and making several calls, all I get is excuses about their inability to take action. Questrade's customer service appears to be nonexistent. I've diligently filled out and signed numerous documents, uploading them as requested, yet I keep receiving meaningless automated emails asking for documents I've already submitted long ago. Adding insult to injury, they've ceased responding to my emails altogether. Questrade is an absolute mess.

It seems that all is good while you are investing with Questrade, but try to get your money out to transfer to another carrier. They did not follow instructions from another provider to forward my funds for investment in a RIF. This was to happen December of 2023. Today I get an application form to sign up for RIF with Questrade. Totally not going to happen. Sent another email indicating a deadline for a resolution. No resolution to date!

As a new user of Questrade for the past three months, I must express my disappointment with the overall experience. In this review, I'll outline some of the major issues I've encountered, shedding light on why I regret choosing Questrade as my investment platform.

First and foremost, one of the most frustrating aspects of my time with Questrade has been the persistent failure of my PIN for accessing their phone system. From day one, this crucial access point has been dysfunctional, leaving me without a reliable means of communication with the company's support team. Despite repeated attempts to resolve this issue, it remains unresolved, severely hindering my ability to engage with Questrade's services efficiently.

Furthermore, the process of converting Canadian dollars to US dollars has been far from satisfactory. Not only does the transaction take an entire day to process, but the lack of transparency regarding the conversion rate is deeply concerning. Unlike other platforms that provide real-time updates on currency conversions, Questrade fails to offer this basic information. Instead, users are left in the dark, forced to contact customer support just to ascertain the conversion rate—a needlessly time-consuming and inconvenient process.

In summary, my experience with Questrade has been marred by technical failures and a lack of transparency, ultimately leading to a significant level of dissatisfaction. From the persistent PIN issue to the opaque currency conversion process, these shortcomings have overshadowed any potential benefits of using Questrade as an investment platform. As a result, I cannot recommend Questrade to others based on my own frustrating experience.

This is not customer service . They lie about everything. They did mistake on my tax form , Spend 2 month on backend forward talk with them, multi hours of wasted time . And still don't want fix my taxes slips, They report to CRA fake information and missing trades. on T5008 but refuse to correct them at all

Opened two Registered Education Savings Plan (RESP) with Questrade. First one went without a hitch. Second one never worked. On the website, it indicated that document has to be submitted (but everything was submitted). In the app it was saying that i needed to contact them to submit more info. Waited one hour to get someone. Answered questions. Was told everything was fine, but one week later account still in limbo. No explanation. No messages.

So onboarding experience is a big zero.

Plus: Was asked in chat what language i wanted for support. I asked for French but was answered only in English.

After this review, I was contacted in my langage by a representative and problems were fixed.

Apart from that, site and app works fine and my transactions went without a hitch.

I think that all customer service reps live in a different country? they had no idea what I am talking....Canadian government needs a form but they keep sending a wrong one..

The "expert" I consulted had no idea what a moving average is! Their display of my existing open orders are difficult to view.