So how good is Trade King?

Not so good thus far... I'm hoping for better but it's not looking so good. I just recently got started trading in the stock market and have for the last couple weeks been using a reputable online broker, but the commissions make it almost impossible to make a profit. One reason is that I started out with a lowly 50 bucks. I've recently added 30 bucks in cash to that fund so now it's basically 80 bucks minus commissions. So at 12.95 per transaction that puts me in a nearly impossible position. By the way, on my first trade, I've almost recovered the commission and pretty soon will make a profit, at least until I sell, then I'll take another huge hit and that's in an almost nightmarish market. 12.95 isn't bad if you're investing thousands of dollars, but hey I've only got 80.

I figured I would try another brokerage that was cheaper so that my profits would be easier to come by and it came down to Zecco.com and TradeKing. Zecco lost out because of the trade schedule, basically twice a day. I would like to get a chance to ride the waves of volatility, especially in this market, so twice a day won't work for my plan. So I chose TradeKing.

The first problem I have is that I only have about $30 in cash and the other 40 something is in the two shares I own. So I needed to get the cash to TK, but without expensive fees. I didn't want to wait forever, but wiring is too expensive, so I chose to go the slow electronic transfer route. There is a 5 business day waiting period, which sucks, but that's life. At first I created an ACH profile (electronic transfer with no fees), but had the wrong info.

So I cost myself 3 trading days. I was sent an email and promptly re-created this profile with correct info. The website nicely informed me that I would be able to trade on February 1st. Earlier today I took a look to see if trading time perhaps came early, but to my chagrin my profile was gone. It was just gone, no notice, no anything at all. So will I trade via TradeKing tomorrow or not?

At first I tried the online chat feature on TradeKing's site. The guy was nice enough, but basically told me that there was no way it could be deleted without a notice being sent to me, but also in the same breath told me that if my bank rejected it then it might disappear. This didn't make sense to me, but I played along. He was going to check a few things, but I didn't have all my bank info handy at the moment so I let him off the hook.

Finding the info he requested, I went for the online chat feature again, getting a different person of course. This young woman(I'm assuming on age by communication style) didn't know what was going on. She did not communicate clearly and basically wasted a bunch of my time. I was pretty irritated at this point.

I called my main brokerage and explained the situation and they verified that they do indeed accept transactions and withdrawals and even checked to see if TradeKing had attempted any communication with them. There had been none, but I was instructed how I might do things from their end which unfortunately involves me sending a form and documentation from TradeKing. But wait, I've had this account for almost two weeks and I don't have any documentation from them yet, so again I'm screwed.

As a last resort I call the TradeKing support number. The nice gentleman on the other end tells me my profile shouldn't have been deleted, but hold on and let me check. I explained the situation twice and he told me there was something in the system showing two profiles having been setup, the first being deleted, just as I had said, but the person who can help me had left for the day. He asked me if I could call back tomorrow, February 1st, the day I should have been able to transfer money in. So it's not looking good. Instead of deleting a part of my account, I almost wish my whole account had been deleted, then it would be perfectly clear I should just give up. Unfortunately, me being who I am, I will call in the morning, hoping they can redeem themselves. We'll see..... I'll let you all know.


EDIT --added further links to rest of story
part 2
final part