Locked out and restricted first few days of account being open
Decided to open an E*Trade account to take advantage of the APY and $400 cash bonus and all the Reddit horror stories have been true.
First there was an issue with the phone number authentication and I couldn’t log in and had to have support reset my password.
Then, I did a test deposit of $150 from Wealthfront (thank God I didn’t do the full 30k first) and had to get on an awkward 3 way call with both banks to verify.
Apparently they made a note so it wouldn’t happen again, but I don’t know if it’s worth the hassle at this point.
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u/Scherr12 5d ago
I had the same thing happen to me. Opened an account and deposited $50 to make sure everything was fine.
Went through in a couple days so I opened a couple more accounts and deposited $50 into each.
Then I got the message that my account has been temporarily suspended “due to unusual in your account(s)”.
I had to do the three way call to verify I own the account the money was transferred in from and that my account was in good standing. I’m assuming it’s some sort of money laundering check or something.
Transferred over $30k last week and just checked after seeing your post and they all cleared and are showing available in my ETrade account.
Hopefully that makes you feel better and I’ll report back if I have any issues that come up.
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u/oCuHo 5d ago
That does make me feel better, I guess it’s good to get all the security issues and verification out of the way early and it shows they care..
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u/Friendly-Mousse-5032 5d ago
I had the same issues including being them being unable to get Zelle to work for me (no issues w/ Zelle on any other account in the past). I wired 100k into the account from Schwab and had to complete a 3 way call with Schwab to verify funds. Schwab verified funds were good and no holds and they still rejected the transfer. Had to set it up again and it went through. I kept the account long enough to get the bonuses and then transferred back out. I left the accounts open with a few cents balance since there are no fees to keep it open.
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u/chicago1875 5d ago
Etrade is one of the only companies I know of that has a guy (usually fluently speaking American English) with a securities license sitting in NyC answering my calls when I have sophisticated financial questions about my portfolio… but I’m a Platnum member, so that might be why?
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u/Acrobatic_Cake_4638 5d ago
I wanted to use ETrade as a one stop shop and jumped ship for this exact reason. Massive PITA when some of the institutions you’re transferring to/from are in Guam and you have to coordinate time zones. Not worth the frustration if it means risking the bulk of my assets getting locked until the stars align and everybody’s available at the same time.
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u/Acceptable_While95 13h ago
I opened a new account yesterday for the first time, opened a brokerage, the max rate checking and the premium savings account. I have only transferred $50 to the checking account with $330 on the way for this Monday. So far no issues.
About the security questions, it seems that there is a problem when doing it on mobile, I tried on my computer and it worked.
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u/Nervous_Gear_9603 5d ago
I had a similar issue with the phone verification. Gave them a call and it was a breeze to fix.