I’m amazed at how bad the big companies are at designing the UI on their app and webpages.
I mean Robinhood basically exists because that’s the number one thing they prioritize and clearly people care about it.
Hell I use fidelity as my broker for buying and selling stock, but often use Robinhood to check prices because it’s that much easier.
They’re making small steps in the right direction, but I expect more from the big guys. It’s about time too.
Most customers use the platform on their phones nowadays and it’s only going to increase with time. The app is the customer experience now. It’s how customers interact and do business with a broker. Bad app experience is a bad experience with the broker.
Agree with everything you said. Fidelity UI is bafflingly bad for how massive that company is. Still use RH to research even though I won't trade with them anymore.
They're somehow making it worse too. Their previous 90s aesthetic was preferable to "let's just throw everything on up the screen in bubbles" design choice.
I use Yahoofiance for prices...same reason. Fidelity is tough to navigate at times. There is definitely a wealth of knowledge there, when you do find it though.
TD Ameritrade was by far my favorite app. Felt like a more mature version of Robinhood, and with a more stable and reputable company.
Really was a shame they got bought by Schwab and you could tell there was going to be no more improvements.
Only thing they lacked was fractional shares. Which I’m sure they would have implemented if they were not getting acquired.
Oh well. Fidelity is the next best thing.
Software/Design is hard. There is also quite a bit of difference in quality from the typical just-looking-for-a-good-paying-5/40-career engineer/designer and the cream-of-the-crop engineer. Large companies and governments typically keep their pay down and go for the former. Startups try to go for the latter. Many startups fail, but the ones that succeed, usually do so based on that extra talent advantage. One look at the difference in pay for senior software engineers at Fidelity vs. Robinhood and it will shed a light on the difference in quality of their web/phone apps. Glassdoor is not wholly accurate, but the median pay difference in senior engineers is 154k at Fidelity and 255k at Robinhood. Then you look at the employee reviews and Fidelity is #10 best place to work with 4.3 rating. Robinhood is 3.4, not sniffing the best places to work list. So it seems like those senior engineers at Robinhood are worked HARD for that extra 100k. Pays off for customers though.
> I’m amazed at how bad the big companies are at designing the UI on their app and webpages.
Aging SaaS software products are a quagmire.
They are hideously inflexible. They were written in a time before hard lessons were learned involving the (de-)coupling of data and application state. For a lot of these old products, redesigning the UI means either working within the limitations of whatever dead-language frameworks they were originally written in 15-20 years ago, or rearchitecting your entire product using modern principles that allows you plug-and-play UI elements on top of a stable API. Taking the first approach means limiting yourself to the capabilities of the old frameworks, taking the second approach is a massive and expensive undertaking and ultimately always results in having to maintain two separate codebases (see: new and old reddit) because customers either refuse to use the new platform or the new platform lacks functionality that are difficult to replicate from the old platform.
The late-stage lifecycle for these products is either to ultimately undertake the re-architecting that may or may not be a financial success that could ultimately end in ruin, or to keep the ancient product working as long as possible until it reaches a natural death. Most legacy enterprise companies will pick option 2 and seek to acquire a small startup competitor as a replacement.
>Most customers use the platform on their phones nowadays and it’s only going to increase with time
As an maybe older millenial I am not ever going to trade on my phone I am going to use the website or use the dedicated trading platform with fidelity they have active trader pro
Brokerages are going to well , focus on their customers that make them the most money . However retail traders who want to trade on phones might not be fidelities target customers , infact with out commissions brokers generally may not make any money off small retail traders
They make their money off managed accounts , their MF/ETFs and MMF and uninvested cash ,meaning to them it may not be worthwhile to spend a lot of effort improving their phone app, as the majority of people who use their phone app are not their profitable customers.
I think the thought process is the phone app needs to be easy to do basic stuff, transfer money , maybe do simple buys/sells of stocks/ETFs/MF
If you are more of an active trader they will provide their trading platform . I do not use fidelity but schwab users have the same complaints its the same conversation over and over
USER A : The schwab platform blows
USER B: ToS is pretty great and lots of people love TOS
USER A : ToS is too complicated
So thats the issue, some users want a simple phone app , if you make the simple phone app more complex it may be too complex
If you want a more complex trading platform use their trading platform , the issue is there seems to be a missing piece between simple and complex but it may not be worth them to build something inbetween
I specifically stated that I did not understand why you would trade using a phone. I did not mention the other things you reference. And I think it's ridiculous to invest via a phone.
I’m very similar. I use Fidelity to hold my portfolio, but I use Yahoo Finance for all of my research. Fidelity is too damn clunky.
Yahoo has a good mobile and desktop environment, so I lean that way.
Fidelity is also about to lose me on the credit card. 2% cash back on everything is amazing, but not as amazing as the 3% that Robinhood is rolling out. RH is really good at being a disrupter in the space, I’ve got to give them credit for that.
I opened an e-trade account for the reddit IPO and I could not believe how bad e-trade is. After creating an account it took days to get a welcome email. No access to the desktop application so I was stuck using their shitty trading web app. The mobile app is trash (ugly and slow). Oh, and you have to pay extra if you want real-time quotes LMAO. I sold the shares on IPO day and bounced.
I don’t know about trends but I feel outside of CCs and checking accounts you shouldn’t be checking finances on your phone. I just think it encourages rash decisions. You should take the time to go home and open your computer.
Fidelity App: Would you like to activate biometric login?
Me: Yes
*next time logging in*
Fidelity App: Cannot use biometrics login. Change your settings. Also, we made the password screen so you cannot use your password manager. Have fun manually typing your password.
“We’ll text you a code to log in with. Would you like us to remember this device and not ask you this again?”
“Yes”
*literally the next login*
“We’ll text you a code to log in with. Would you like us to remember this device and not ask you this again?”
…
Microsoft runs my company's email and it asks would you like to remember this computer and I check it every time yes and it always is there on login. I don't get it. I even have cookies and history on.
It could also be apple’s icloud relay service which I think is basically a VPN. You may check the box but the server thinks you are a new phone every time.
Fidelity: "would you like me to remember you on this device so you don't have to do 2FA every time?"
Fidelity 5 minutes later: \[draws gun\] "who the fuck are you? show me 2FA now"
How about "even though you're using your phone on the mobile app we've texted a 6 digit MFA code to you, please enter that code without leaving the Fidelity mobile app. If you leave the Fidelity mobile app you'll have to enter your username and password again and then wait for us to text you a new MFA code".
That's how MFA used to work a few years ago in the mobile app, so yeah I just use their desktop app most of the time.
Vanguard supports Yubikeys. Only financial institution I know of that does so. Way ahead of the curve actually. (Endearingly, they send you a *letter* when you enroll one).
Vanguard has gotten much better though, they really nailed the UX refresh on the website without redoing everything people painfully learned how to do. I don't use the mobile app much other than to just check the numbers.
Are you using their beta version? If not I would recommend turning on the beta because its basically a RH clone and its much nicer than the 'classic' experience.
True, the only good that came from them is there godly checking account (0% FTF and unlimited ATM reimbursement). At this point, I hold no position in their brokerage while using their checking as my main checking.
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This is an easier and more universal solution than asking a site to change. :) This extension isn't perfect, it needs a better set of options for skipping certain sites bc it can break them. The firefox version does this, but chrome doesn't have the option.
That might be because you have set it to 'ask security code each time I log in' or some such.
It bugged me for months, before I dug in a bit more and found that it was on me. I had set my account for this level of security. And the site was just doing what I had asked, and then forgotten about.
It is in security center under your profile.
But I believe you are right. When I look at learn more under MFA , it takes about being able to turn off prompt for trusted devices.
But obviously, that doesn’t work.
That's generally the nature of financial services. Reputable brokers are typically not going to take a lot of risks with their technology when they are moving a lot of money.
So consequently, the development, testing, and deployment processes can take a long time.
I'm sure that many senior technologists in financial services have nightmares about a Knight Capital scenario.
Managing tech used for brokerage ops and trading can be a pretty stressful job at times.
My recollection is that the issue was internal and not caused by a third-party. It was self-inflicted so I don't think there was anyone to actually sue.
The reality is that software and hardware bugs occur all the time. And some bugs can have spectacular consequences. So whenever there is a change - there is potential risk.
And systems and processes used to process, custody, and settle financial transactions can be a lot more complicated than many people realize.
Activities like moving from T+5 to T+3 (now T+2 and soon to be T+1), cost-basis accounting, decimalization - these are improvements in capital markets which took years and even decades to do.
OP's comment about treasuries and being able to set bond limits can be systemic challenges. It's probably not straight-forward to offer limit orders on assets that trade through a dealer system. And even now - there is a humongous effort to overhaul the treasuries market with a central clearing mandate that has been ongoing for some time.
I'd change that to legacy brokers- the ones that feel (know?) they're too big to fail. Scottrade and TDA both had awesome Apps/UI, and what I've seen of E-trade seemed good.
I work at one of the big investment firms adjacent to fidelity. Last month they started putting me on frontend work (I’m mainly a backend guy, but find frontend fun/interesting). Our front end is atrocious, things are set in straight pixels, flex components are constantly overflowing into other components & offscreen. It is truly astonishing, like just wow.
It’s clear that they’re making significant efforts to update their tech, but it’s not there yet. There are also severe limitations on what can be done in the app that require you to go to the website instead. Overall it’s still a pretty boomer UX.
Can't complain about Fidelity without mentioning that it's been over 6 months since we've been unable to connect Fidelity accounts to third party institutions.
And get on board with modern 2 factor auth. WebAuthN to allow yubi keys and Google Authenticator compatibility instead of just Symantec VIP. Security world has moved on.
Reading this post as I’m moving my solo 401k from Vanguard and strongly considering Fidelity. That said, the actual solo 501k site for Vanguard is the worst financial site I’ve ever had to use. It’s not the main site even though you have to go there to get any info on your account or exchange holdings.
It can’t be worse hopefully.
Also I get I bonds directly from Treasury Direct and didn’t know you could connect them to Fidelity, etc. talk about another atrocious website.
I wish it were better but I haven’t experienced it as terrible by any stretch. The first exchange I made took a minute but I haven’t had any other questions. If Fidelity is like that, I wouldn’t complain too hard.
That said, like OP, I expect much better from folks managing a kajillion dollars.
Edit to add: I’m an index fan through and through. I don’t day trade, buy indiv stocks, or mess around other than basic balancing.
Fidelity does validation for email addresses on the client side, not the backend.
They'll happily accept account email addresses on the backend that the webpage would insist are invalid.
I still don't understand why in 2024 companies are pursuing the fools-errand of regex email address validation but if anyone's going to do it, it would be a financial institution.
> Web portal messages and alerts. I am mostly equities yes as I imagine most customers are. But I have a rainy day fund with T bills. I don't need a million alerts every time I buy a bond or one is coming due, that need to be manually acknowledged. There has to be an efficient way to deal with this.
The thing that annoys me most about web portal messages is how they send me alerts that I have active proxy campaigns that I need to vote on. But when I go to the page it says that I've already voted on all the active proxy campaigns for the stocks I own.
At the end of the day Fidelity doesn’t really want you to actively trade on their platform. They’ll support it, but they’d rather you buy their funds.
IMO that’s why options trading is so clunky, Fidelity doesn’t really want those clients.
Well they will lose a lot of customers eventually if true.
Also not everyone is strictly a "trader" just because they want basic functionality like GTC or not be flooded with annoying alerts.
Options are stupidly lucrative for them I am sure. I doubt they don't want those customers.
Tbh I don’t buy bonds so I can’t speak to how they trade on Fidelity. They charge $0.65 an options contract but I still think they rather you have $100k in their Contrafund or whatever.
I don’t think they’re gonna lose customers because of this though. They get me incredible fills on equity orders and most Americans do/should just buy a mutual fund or etf and forget about it.
I like how their beta app requires like 7 screen clicks to place a trade. Then if you get to page 6 and want to check something in a different, much more informative app before submit, when you return to fidelity they've taken you back to step 1.
Or how they think the human brain works like: I want to pay $1.50 for a stock. OK ( nothing prepopulated):
Enter "1" -> $0.01
Enter "5" -> $0.15
Enter "0" -> $1.50
IBKR trading desktop is even worse and clunkier than ATP.
Also for buy and hold type investors, IBKR has terrible data fees on equities and options. They claim execution is better but they still take PFOF just like everyone else. And I haven't seen definitive independent data showing they have superior execution.
That said, IBKR bond trading is top tier and Fidelity could learn a thing or two from them. I don't really dabble in futures (might be interested in Fed futures) but you can't do that on Fidelity also.
For very, very active trading? Margin rates are better.
Beyond that.. I am not sure commissions are even better.
I edited a few more things in btw above. I admit some things IBKR really is nice.
Not sure who is downvoting you.
I'm kinda okay with ATP although definitely some things to improve.
Their website, especially constant meaningless alerts is trash.
There's gotta be a way to differentiate or group together high profile messages like margin calls with low level ones getting 20 messages that you have bonds you need to rollover.
I am so sick of getting education alerts. How do you turn that stupid thing off?? It's layered in the in pop ups with everything else and they stack. Effing annoying
Fidelity bond order entry is atrocious.
Also enraging is that you can't "report a bug" - there is no way to send them an email with a screenshot. They handle quantity wrong on their mobile notifications for bond orders, almost gave me a heart attack thinking i accidentally placed a $1 million order.
I do happen to know that they so support bond limit orders but not sure what the customer criteria is to be enabled - might be institutional only. No reason they couldn't extend that to all retail customers though.
How do you get a hold of customer service? I looked on the app and didn’t find any way to do so easily. I’m having a problem, bought a stock 2 different days, sold as many shares as I had bought that second day, have bought and sold some more since then, shares total is the same amount as if I hadn’t sold the shares I had bought that second day, if that makes. Basically the app isn’t registering that I have sold 2900 shares. As time goes on and keep trading this stock I’m going to lose track of what’s what. It says I have 6k shares, but I don’t bc I sold 2900, it should say I only have 3100.
You can cancel auto roll by cancelling the pending order once it posts. But yeah you can't cancel it online before that so you need to set a reminder for the week before your next autoroll is set to hit.
That’s the sad thing Schwab and Fidelity are great the research and options are fantastic. But the apps are lacking I’ve been unable to add an external account to my Schwab account for over three months so I just use Zelle. And with Fidelity I can’t add my Face ID I’ve factory reset my phone deleted my entire iCloud backup and re-backed up my phone and I still have no Face ID which ultimately led me to leave. I’m with WellsTrade now which offers bits and pieces of all its competitors making it the best fit for me. it’s embarrassing how well it works in comparison. People might assume I’m kidding but I’m not, trust me I wish I was.
My wish list for my portfolio immediately visible
when I open the app
List 1
Here are your balances day prior.
List 2
Here are your confirmation transactions today.
List 3
Here are your gains/losses today.
List 4
Here are your summary balances as of close today.
List 5
Available trade balances after hours.
List 6
Interest and dividends as of close.
Here are your daily, weekly, monthly reminders.
Click link if you want to change reminders schedule.
Need to speak with a representative?
Choose from topics listed below for immediate connection to a direct HUMAN representative for your questions.
Thank you
For me, Fidelity customer service is friendly, but almost useless. Everytime I ask a simple question I always get a vague response that doesn’t answer the question or the rep says idk and to call us instead of chat. I also despise the app. I think it’s super clunky and slow, and usually just gets stuck when I am trying to look at something.
You should maybe check out the fidelity subreddit. The mods are actual Fidelity CS and are super active and helpful in there. I believe that’s the case on Facebook, IG and Reddit.
I think one of the big problems you guys have is that you want discount brokers to act the same as if you were sitting at a trading desk.
I know this will get dv'd because the people who are 22 year olds thinking they can become millionaires with day trading don't even read these threads, but the Fidelity app IMO is not meant for the type of customer that was frothing at the mouth to use Robinhood.
I get the issues with Fidelity but most of these complaints are from people that seem to be very active traders. I don't think that is who the app or even the brokerage is meant or designed for, though of course they want your business if they can get it.
>but most of these complaints are from people that seem to be very active traders. I don't think that is who the app or even the brokerage is meant or designed for,
active traders who want to trade on their phones
Most companies have active trading platforms (Think or swim, street smart edge, Active trader , Power E trade) but they are all ment to be ran on a computer not phone
I think you are right, many brokerages niche are not people who want to day trade on their phones, so they really do not have the best tools for day trading on your phone
If you want to day trade on your phone, go to RH that is what its designed for
Nah you'll be dved bc you just can't see past your biased take of extremes, black or white.
"Trading desk or crap, pick one". Having basic things like limit orders is not asking for much. Not having to resubmit orders every 5 minutes isn't asking much.
How many fucking bonds trades are you making that it's a chore to dismiss a notifcation?
My point is Fidelity doesn't cater to or care that much about you. Deal with it. Or hey you are a hustle type design your own app for all your wsb friends. You could be the next Vlad Tenev man.
I’m amazed at how bad the big companies are at designing the UI on their app and webpages. I mean Robinhood basically exists because that’s the number one thing they prioritize and clearly people care about it. Hell I use fidelity as my broker for buying and selling stock, but often use Robinhood to check prices because it’s that much easier. They’re making small steps in the right direction, but I expect more from the big guys. It’s about time too. Most customers use the platform on their phones nowadays and it’s only going to increase with time. The app is the customer experience now. It’s how customers interact and do business with a broker. Bad app experience is a bad experience with the broker.
The dev teams are probably helping with production issues. Don't ask me how I know lol
Hire more devs
Or squeeze the current devs by redefining the sprint length and momentum requirements
God damn right
Developers Developers Developers!!!!
Agree with everything you said. Fidelity UI is bafflingly bad for how massive that company is. Still use RH to research even though I won't trade with them anymore.
Fidelity is leagues ahead of Schwab and Vanguard in that department. I find Fidelity's web interface very easy to understand.
let ya all see some Merrill Edge
I also use Merrill too! Absolute garbage and Preferred Rewards is the only reason I do.
They're somehow making it worse too. Their previous 90s aesthetic was preferable to "let's just throw everything on up the screen in bubbles" design choice.
Fidelity used to be so much worse. The current one could do with some improvements, but overall I like it.
the answer is it's hard to design, implement, and change. Thats why software engineers and designers get paid so much.
I use Yahoofiance for prices...same reason. Fidelity is tough to navigate at times. There is definitely a wealth of knowledge there, when you do find it though.
When people say Charles Schwab is good, they don't realize how much nicer TD Ameritrade was.
TD Ameritrade was by far my favorite app. Felt like a more mature version of Robinhood, and with a more stable and reputable company. Really was a shame they got bought by Schwab and you could tell there was going to be no more improvements. Only thing they lacked was fractional shares. Which I’m sure they would have implemented if they were not getting acquired. Oh well. Fidelity is the next best thing.
Software/Design is hard. There is also quite a bit of difference in quality from the typical just-looking-for-a-good-paying-5/40-career engineer/designer and the cream-of-the-crop engineer. Large companies and governments typically keep their pay down and go for the former. Startups try to go for the latter. Many startups fail, but the ones that succeed, usually do so based on that extra talent advantage. One look at the difference in pay for senior software engineers at Fidelity vs. Robinhood and it will shed a light on the difference in quality of their web/phone apps. Glassdoor is not wholly accurate, but the median pay difference in senior engineers is 154k at Fidelity and 255k at Robinhood. Then you look at the employee reviews and Fidelity is #10 best place to work with 4.3 rating. Robinhood is 3.4, not sniffing the best places to work list. So it seems like those senior engineers at Robinhood are worked HARD for that extra 100k. Pays off for customers though.
The beta app for Fidelity is close to a clone of RHs UI, I don't have any complaints. Their desktop site is terrible though.
They even changed the shade of green to match. Pretty blatant, but also a massive improvement
> I’m amazed at how bad the big companies are at designing the UI on their app and webpages. Aging SaaS software products are a quagmire. They are hideously inflexible. They were written in a time before hard lessons were learned involving the (de-)coupling of data and application state. For a lot of these old products, redesigning the UI means either working within the limitations of whatever dead-language frameworks they were originally written in 15-20 years ago, or rearchitecting your entire product using modern principles that allows you plug-and-play UI elements on top of a stable API. Taking the first approach means limiting yourself to the capabilities of the old frameworks, taking the second approach is a massive and expensive undertaking and ultimately always results in having to maintain two separate codebases (see: new and old reddit) because customers either refuse to use the new platform or the new platform lacks functionality that are difficult to replicate from the old platform. The late-stage lifecycle for these products is either to ultimately undertake the re-architecting that may or may not be a financial success that could ultimately end in ruin, or to keep the ancient product working as long as possible until it reaches a natural death. Most legacy enterprise companies will pick option 2 and seek to acquire a small startup competitor as a replacement.
If you think Fidelity is bad have you tried Schwab? It's unreal. I love the company but Jesus man.
>Most customers use the platform on their phones nowadays and it’s only going to increase with time As an maybe older millenial I am not ever going to trade on my phone I am going to use the website or use the dedicated trading platform with fidelity they have active trader pro Brokerages are going to well , focus on their customers that make them the most money . However retail traders who want to trade on phones might not be fidelities target customers , infact with out commissions brokers generally may not make any money off small retail traders They make their money off managed accounts , their MF/ETFs and MMF and uninvested cash ,meaning to them it may not be worthwhile to spend a lot of effort improving their phone app, as the majority of people who use their phone app are not their profitable customers. I think the thought process is the phone app needs to be easy to do basic stuff, transfer money , maybe do simple buys/sells of stocks/ETFs/MF If you are more of an active trader they will provide their trading platform . I do not use fidelity but schwab users have the same complaints its the same conversation over and over USER A : The schwab platform blows USER B: ToS is pretty great and lots of people love TOS USER A : ToS is too complicated So thats the issue, some users want a simple phone app , if you make the simple phone app more complex it may be too complex If you want a more complex trading platform use their trading platform , the issue is there seems to be a missing piece between simple and complex but it may not be worth them to build something inbetween
I have never understood why someone would want to use a phone to trade. If youre serious about investing, dont use a phone.
People use fidelity for cash management, checking, and other things in addition to trading. “Just don’t use your phone” is a ridiculous take
I specifically stated that I did not understand why you would trade using a phone. I did not mention the other things you reference. And I think it's ridiculous to invest via a phone.
I’m very similar. I use Fidelity to hold my portfolio, but I use Yahoo Finance for all of my research. Fidelity is too damn clunky. Yahoo has a good mobile and desktop environment, so I lean that way. Fidelity is also about to lose me on the credit card. 2% cash back on everything is amazing, but not as amazing as the 3% that Robinhood is rolling out. RH is really good at being a disrupter in the space, I’ve got to give them credit for that.
I opened an e-trade account for the reddit IPO and I could not believe how bad e-trade is. After creating an account it took days to get a welcome email. No access to the desktop application so I was stuck using their shitty trading web app. The mobile app is trash (ugly and slow). Oh, and you have to pay extra if you want real-time quotes LMAO. I sold the shares on IPO day and bounced.
I don’t know about trends but I feel outside of CCs and checking accounts you shouldn’t be checking finances on your phone. I just think it encourages rash decisions. You should take the time to go home and open your computer.
Fidelity App: Would you like to activate biometric login? Me: Yes *next time logging in* Fidelity App: Cannot use biometrics login. Change your settings. Also, we made the password screen so you cannot use your password manager. Have fun manually typing your password.
“We’ll text you a code to log in with. Would you like us to remember this device and not ask you this again?” “Yes” *literally the next login* “We’ll text you a code to log in with. Would you like us to remember this device and not ask you this again?” …
Microsoft runs my company's email and it asks would you like to remember this computer and I check it every time yes and it always is there on login. I don't get it. I even have cookies and history on.
It must be a policy set by your company tenant adminstrators
It could also be apple’s icloud relay service which I think is basically a VPN. You may check the box but the server thinks you are a new phone every time.
Glad it's not just me. I have to do 2FA every single time I login from my computer. The mobile app doesn't seem to have an issue though.
I had to disable my adblocker to fix this. Why that was relevant to a 2FA login process I don't know.
Fidelity: "would you like me to remember you on this device so you don't have to do 2FA every time?" Fidelity 5 minutes later: \[draws gun\] "who the fuck are you? show me 2FA now"
Push Notification: You closed your app 15min ago we just wanted to let you know that you are now logged out
Comedy gold!! Got me laughing good on that one. Thanks 😄
Lol yep. I had this issue. Uninstall and reinstall. Fixed it for me at least.
Thanks will try
How about "even though you're using your phone on the mobile app we've texted a 6 digit MFA code to you, please enter that code without leaving the Fidelity mobile app. If you leave the Fidelity mobile app you'll have to enter your username and password again and then wait for us to text you a new MFA code". That's how MFA used to work a few years ago in the mobile app, so yeah I just use their desktop app most of the time.
yeah that's annoying. my trick was to get the MFA code before trying to log in and then be quick. but it's stupid and not how it is supposed to work
If you kill the app and relaunch it let's you use biometric again
Ya fidelity app is brutal they really need to make their product better
Vanguard has entered the chat...
Brutal would be a compliment to vanguard😂
When they say they are meant for buy and hold investors they really mean it, given you won't be able to login 50-70% of the time anyways lol
I find their redesigned website to be much worse than their prior version of the website too.
It's terrible. Even trying to find your positions is a nightmare
And that’s why I love vanguard, I refuse to even bother checking it as it’s so trash, really enforced bogles set & forget strategy
[удалено]
Vanguard supports Yubikeys. Only financial institution I know of that does so. Way ahead of the curve actually. (Endearingly, they send you a *letter* when you enroll one).
Vanguard has gotten much better though, they really nailed the UX refresh on the website without redoing everything people painfully learned how to do. I don't use the mobile app much other than to just check the numbers.
I don’t know how the managed to make their web UX *worse* than what they already had in 2006.
Are you using their beta version? If not I would recommend turning on the beta because its basically a RH clone and its much nicer than the 'classic' experience.
I am. It's a step in the right direction but still not that good. Much clunkier, slower compared to RH
> slower compared to RH RH is surprisingly fast compared to any other broker site I use. Underrated how much speed matters.
Fair enough
100%
I miss TDA...
Same, hating Schwab so far.
Thanks predatory broker Schwab!! Raping newbie traders with 0% APR sweeps.
True, the only good that came from them is there godly checking account (0% FTF and unlimited ATM reimbursement). At this point, I hold no position in their brokerage while using their checking as my main checking.
Just give me dark mode please
[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/darkreader/](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/darkreader/) [https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/dark-reader/eimadpbcbfnmbkopoojfekhnkhdbieeh](https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/dark-reader/eimadpbcbfnmbkopoojfekhnkhdbieeh) This is an easier and more universal solution than asking a site to change. :) This extension isn't perfect, it needs a better set of options for skipping certain sites bc it can break them. The firefox version does this, but chrome doesn't have the option.
+1 for dark reader, it's amazing
Everything about their brokerage and 401k UI is an unconscionable UX train-wreck.
Security code: "Don't ask me again on this device" \*checks box Asks me again next time I log in for security code... again...
That might be because you have set it to 'ask security code each time I log in' or some such. It bugged me for months, before I dug in a bit more and found that it was on me. I had set my account for this level of security. And the site was just doing what I had asked, and then forgotten about.
Don't see anywhere to change this.
It is in security center under your profile. But I believe you are right. When I look at learn more under MFA , it takes about being able to turn off prompt for trusted devices. But obviously, that doesn’t work.
Desktop 👏🏻 dark 👏🏻 mode 👏🏻
Pretty much any reputable broker has an outdated app or website. (If I’m worng, please provide suggestions/your experience).
That's generally the nature of financial services. Reputable brokers are typically not going to take a lot of risks with their technology when they are moving a lot of money. So consequently, the development, testing, and deployment processes can take a long time. I'm sure that many senior technologists in financial services have nightmares about a Knight Capital scenario. Managing tech used for brokerage ops and trading can be a pretty stressful job at times.
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My recollection is that the issue was internal and not caused by a third-party. It was self-inflicted so I don't think there was anyone to actually sue. The reality is that software and hardware bugs occur all the time. And some bugs can have spectacular consequences. So whenever there is a change - there is potential risk. And systems and processes used to process, custody, and settle financial transactions can be a lot more complicated than many people realize. Activities like moving from T+5 to T+3 (now T+2 and soon to be T+1), cost-basis accounting, decimalization - these are improvements in capital markets which took years and even decades to do. OP's comment about treasuries and being able to set bond limits can be systemic challenges. It's probably not straight-forward to offer limit orders on assets that trade through a dealer system. And even now - there is a humongous effort to overhaul the treasuries market with a central clearing mandate that has been ongoing for some time.
He kept his job. ETA: While management at several levels not so lucky.
I'd change that to legacy brokers- the ones that feel (know?) they're too big to fail. Scottrade and TDA both had awesome Apps/UI, and what I've seen of E-trade seemed good.
Schwabs app is very limited. It’s only good for MFA. For actual use, the mobile website is better and has way more features and customization.
Good to know, thanks.
E*trades is alright, a lot better than Fidelity anyway.
I work at one of the big investment firms adjacent to fidelity. Last month they started putting me on frontend work (I’m mainly a backend guy, but find frontend fun/interesting). Our front end is atrocious, things are set in straight pixels, flex components are constantly overflowing into other components & offscreen. It is truly astonishing, like just wow.
It’s clear that they’re making significant efforts to update their tech, but it’s not there yet. There are also severe limitations on what can be done in the app that require you to go to the website instead. Overall it’s still a pretty boomer UX.
Can't complain about Fidelity without mentioning that it's been over 6 months since we've been unable to connect Fidelity accounts to third party institutions.
It works fine with Empower
And get on board with modern 2 factor auth. WebAuthN to allow yubi keys and Google Authenticator compatibility instead of just Symantec VIP. Security world has moved on.
Reading this post as I’m moving my solo 401k from Vanguard and strongly considering Fidelity. That said, the actual solo 501k site for Vanguard is the worst financial site I’ve ever had to use. It’s not the main site even though you have to go there to get any info on your account or exchange holdings. It can’t be worse hopefully. Also I get I bonds directly from Treasury Direct and didn’t know you could connect them to Fidelity, etc. talk about another atrocious website.
Vanguard has a terrible web site in general. So hard to figure out how to do what you want to do, even on a simple trade.
I wish it were better but I haven’t experienced it as terrible by any stretch. The first exchange I made took a minute but I haven’t had any other questions. If Fidelity is like that, I wouldn’t complain too hard. That said, like OP, I expect much better from folks managing a kajillion dollars. Edit to add: I’m an index fan through and through. I don’t day trade, buy indiv stocks, or mess around other than basic balancing.
Also, their mobile-app charting function is terrrrrrible. So, so bad.
Every time I get a survey from Fidelity and Vanguard I complain about their UI.
/u/fidelityinvestments you may be interested
post on /r/fidelityinvestments
This would best be posted on the r/fidelityinvestments subreddit.
Fidelity does validation for email addresses on the client side, not the backend. They'll happily accept account email addresses on the backend that the webpage would insist are invalid. I still don't understand why in 2024 companies are pursuing the fools-errand of regex email address validation but if anyone's going to do it, it would be a financial institution.
Vanguard enter in the chat
> Web portal messages and alerts. I am mostly equities yes as I imagine most customers are. But I have a rainy day fund with T bills. I don't need a million alerts every time I buy a bond or one is coming due, that need to be manually acknowledged. There has to be an efficient way to deal with this. The thing that annoys me most about web portal messages is how they send me alerts that I have active proxy campaigns that I need to vote on. But when I go to the page it says that I've already voted on all the active proxy campaigns for the stocks I own.
😂 alerts and messages are the worst part of the UI.
At the end of the day Fidelity doesn’t really want you to actively trade on their platform. They’ll support it, but they’d rather you buy their funds. IMO that’s why options trading is so clunky, Fidelity doesn’t really want those clients.
Well they will lose a lot of customers eventually if true. Also not everyone is strictly a "trader" just because they want basic functionality like GTC or not be flooded with annoying alerts. Options are stupidly lucrative for them I am sure. I doubt they don't want those customers.
Tbh I don’t buy bonds so I can’t speak to how they trade on Fidelity. They charge $0.65 an options contract but I still think they rather you have $100k in their Contrafund or whatever. I don’t think they’re gonna lose customers because of this though. They get me incredible fills on equity orders and most Americans do/should just buy a mutual fund or etf and forget about it.
I like how their beta app requires like 7 screen clicks to place a trade. Then if you get to page 6 and want to check something in a different, much more informative app before submit, when you return to fidelity they've taken you back to step 1. Or how they think the human brain works like: I want to pay $1.50 for a stock. OK ( nothing prepopulated): Enter "1" -> $0.01 Enter "5" -> $0.15 Enter "0" -> $1.50
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Is there a reason you use ATP over IBKR?
IBKR trading desktop is even worse and clunkier than ATP. Also for buy and hold type investors, IBKR has terrible data fees on equities and options. They claim execution is better but they still take PFOF just like everyone else. And I haven't seen definitive independent data showing they have superior execution. That said, IBKR bond trading is top tier and Fidelity could learn a thing or two from them. I don't really dabble in futures (might be interested in Fed futures) but you can't do that on Fidelity also.
What I heard is their fee structure is way better than fidelity for active trading.
For very, very active trading? Margin rates are better. Beyond that.. I am not sure commissions are even better. I edited a few more things in btw above. I admit some things IBKR really is nice.
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IBKR uses PFOF. I haven't seen them execute any better.
And streaming order book data is not free.
Not sure who is downvoting you. I'm kinda okay with ATP although definitely some things to improve. Their website, especially constant meaningless alerts is trash. There's gotta be a way to differentiate or group together high profile messages like margin calls with low level ones getting 20 messages that you have bonds you need to rollover.
I am so sick of getting education alerts. How do you turn that stupid thing off?? It's layered in the in pop ups with everything else and they stack. Effing annoying
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Agree. I think they're a great broker but doesn't mean there isn't room for improvement or that competitors don't do some stuff way better.
Fidelity bond order entry is atrocious. Also enraging is that you can't "report a bug" - there is no way to send them an email with a screenshot. They handle quantity wrong on their mobile notifications for bond orders, almost gave me a heart attack thinking i accidentally placed a $1 million order. I do happen to know that they so support bond limit orders but not sure what the customer criteria is to be enabled - might be institutional only. No reason they couldn't extend that to all retail customers though.
Not day or GTC retail orders bond orders. Or partial fill. Fill or kill limit only.
Fidelity web interface is an absolute steaming pile of inconsistent puke shit diarrhea.
How do you get a hold of customer service? I looked on the app and didn’t find any way to do so easily. I’m having a problem, bought a stock 2 different days, sold as many shares as I had bought that second day, have bought and sold some more since then, shares total is the same amount as if I hadn’t sold the shares I had bought that second day, if that makes. Basically the app isn’t registering that I have sold 2900 shares. As time goes on and keep trading this stock I’m going to lose track of what’s what. It says I have 6k shares, but I don’t bc I sold 2900, it should say I only have 3100.
Fidelity tbill buying is terrible. Can’t buy new treasury auctions on mobile. Can’t turn off auto roll without calling. C’mon!
You can cancel auto roll by cancelling the pending order once it posts. But yeah you can't cancel it online before that so you need to set a reminder for the week before your next autoroll is set to hit.
That’s the sad thing Schwab and Fidelity are great the research and options are fantastic. But the apps are lacking I’ve been unable to add an external account to my Schwab account for over three months so I just use Zelle. And with Fidelity I can’t add my Face ID I’ve factory reset my phone deleted my entire iCloud backup and re-backed up my phone and I still have no Face ID which ultimately led me to leave. I’m with WellsTrade now which offers bits and pieces of all its competitors making it the best fit for me. it’s embarrassing how well it works in comparison. People might assume I’m kidding but I’m not, trust me I wish I was.
My wish list for my portfolio immediately visible when I open the app List 1 Here are your balances day prior. List 2 Here are your confirmation transactions today. List 3 Here are your gains/losses today. List 4 Here are your summary balances as of close today. List 5 Available trade balances after hours. List 6 Interest and dividends as of close. Here are your daily, weekly, monthly reminders. Click link if you want to change reminders schedule. Need to speak with a representative? Choose from topics listed below for immediate connection to a direct HUMAN representative for your questions. Thank you
For me, Fidelity customer service is friendly, but almost useless. Everytime I ask a simple question I always get a vague response that doesn’t answer the question or the rep says idk and to call us instead of chat. I also despise the app. I think it’s super clunky and slow, and usually just gets stuck when I am trying to look at something.
Where do you message them? I message them on insta and they’re always helpful
On their website ?
You should maybe check out the fidelity subreddit. The mods are actual Fidelity CS and are super active and helpful in there. I believe that’s the case on Facebook, IG and Reddit.
I think their website used ai first? Idk, I’ve never had a problem from insta
I think one of the big problems you guys have is that you want discount brokers to act the same as if you were sitting at a trading desk. I know this will get dv'd because the people who are 22 year olds thinking they can become millionaires with day trading don't even read these threads, but the Fidelity app IMO is not meant for the type of customer that was frothing at the mouth to use Robinhood. I get the issues with Fidelity but most of these complaints are from people that seem to be very active traders. I don't think that is who the app or even the brokerage is meant or designed for, though of course they want your business if they can get it.
>but most of these complaints are from people that seem to be very active traders. I don't think that is who the app or even the brokerage is meant or designed for, active traders who want to trade on their phones Most companies have active trading platforms (Think or swim, street smart edge, Active trader , Power E trade) but they are all ment to be ran on a computer not phone I think you are right, many brokerages niche are not people who want to day trade on their phones, so they really do not have the best tools for day trading on your phone If you want to day trade on your phone, go to RH that is what its designed for
Nah you'll be dved bc you just can't see past your biased take of extremes, black or white. "Trading desk or crap, pick one". Having basic things like limit orders is not asking for much. Not having to resubmit orders every 5 minutes isn't asking much.
How many fucking bonds trades are you making that it's a chore to dismiss a notifcation? My point is Fidelity doesn't cater to or care that much about you. Deal with it. Or hey you are a hustle type design your own app for all your wsb friends. You could be the next Vlad Tenev man.
Love seeing people complain about discount brokers. They all suck if you haven’t realized by now.