Brokers and investment projects. How to check the quality of support and find out the opinions of clients
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This article discusses one of the key stages when choosing a broker or investment project. It involves communication with support and former/current clients. The goal is to understand the reality that is hidden by the company's advertising slogans and banners.
First, you should contact the support service and evaluate the quality of its work.
International financial companies, as a rule, form large support staffs. They hire employees for different desks: English-speaking, Russian-speaking and other languages, depending on the regions of service. Specialists answer questions and help clients by phone, email and chats. They are the “face” of their employer and reflect its values.
Secondly, you should turn to the opinions of current and former clients of the company to find out first-hand how cooperation is actually built. You need to find user reviews on the Internet. Traders and investors share their experiences on social networks and thematic sites. Their reviews contain answers to many questions, but most importantly, they answer “Does the service provider fulfill its obligations or not?”.
The benefit of this article is that you will learn how to test support and evaluate reviews of brokers and investment projects. Both communications help to understand how a financial company works in reality.
How to check support, or support service
To test the support service, contact them. Ask questions in the chat, request a call back or call them yourself.
It is important to get advice before making a deposit. You can check the information on the website and the client agreement. Or ask them to send you scanned copies of the registration certificate and license.
What should you focus on when checking the support?
- Speed of response to your request.
- Speed of response to your request.
- Качество ответа.Quality of response.
- General tone of communication.
Stop signals when communicating with support
1. Ignoring
A common situation among offshore service providers is that they are impossible to contact. They provide email addresses and phone numbers on their websites, but ignore emails and calls. This behavior reflects the worst on the company. They are most likely avoiding existing clients who are waiting for a withdrawal and do not want to be caught off guard.
Contact information should be working, and it is worth checking for yourself.
2. Intrusiveness
Traders often say that their broker's support service "does not let you live". It is important that company representatives listen to requests not to call and provide news via email. Otherwise, they interfere with trading and more.
The level of intrusiveness can be determined after the first contact. If you contacted them once and then received a lot of unwanted calls, it is better not to sign a contract. This situation can be regarded as a warning that the support team has the task of (1) bringing in clients and (2) constantly motivating them to deposit money.
3. Refusal of correspondence
Some brokers and investment projects provide online chats on their websites. However, they refuse to use them: to any question they answer “leave your phone number and we will call you back”. In the modern world, chat is a full-fledged method of communication. The support service must process text requests.
There is a simple explanation why companies prefer to communicate by phone. A live conversation allows you to manipulate the interlocutor and effectively gain trust.
4. Pressure to deposit money
When victims of financial fraud share their experiences, their stories often begin with the words “I was in a hurry to top up my deposit.” However, you shouldn’t rush this. You should especially slow down if the support team is rushing you. A company representative may try to convince you of a “cool promotion” that is ending, a “good moment” that is starting, etc.
Pressure associated with depositing money is a reason to give up the idea of cooperating with the company. The support service violates professional ethics when it demands that you hurry up with making a deposit. Most likely, the support team receives a percentage of the funds raised, but this is wrong. Remember that no one should rush you to “get rich.”
5. Refusal to send documents
As already mentioned, the support team’s duty is to help clients. Your request to send scanned copies of the registration certificate and license should not cause aggression. You should also not hear excuses. There can be no compromises, because they will inevitably lead to losses.
Representatives of reliable companies publish official documents on their website and accompany them with active links to the registries. When a user requests scans, support should send the corresponding link and it should be working.
If there are no contacts on the company's website or you have found one of the stop signals, abandon the idea of "multiplying funds" with this market representative.
Warning about "cold" calls
An important STOP sign that you should focus on is "cold" calling. If you did not request a call, but you were contacted and offered to earn money, it is better to refuse cooperation and not even get into the conversation.
A “cold” client base is a huge table of contacts and names of people, collected by geolocation and interests. Databases of potential traders and investors are sold on the Internet, and dubious brokers and investment projects buy them.
People from these bases fall under the attack of callers not of their own free will, but because they once subscribed to a newsletter, trading signals, or simply registered on a financial website.
Reliable companies do not instruct their employees to call “potential clients”. Firstly, this is unethical business development. Secondly, they invest money in online promotion.
“Cold” calling is usually done by dishonest companies. Managers make hundreds of calls a day in search of new victims. They hook people by promising to turn $200 into $20,000 in a couple of deals. Such promises and similar ones are NEVER fulfilled.
Beware of cold calling. And remember that the support of a reliable company does not pester you with calls.
