Grant , thanks for the info. Vacman

It’s encouraging to see that Sogoinvest has chosen to respond to the margin interest issue. It appears that Sogoinvest is changing its policy. See

http://indexfundfan.wordpress.com/2006/08/12/sogoinvest-experience-update/

where I posted Sogoinvest’s reply when I asked about them about their margin interest policy. I also called them and was told the same thing. If they changed their policy, I just wished that they would say so instead of saying

“SogoInvest policy has always been to charge margin interest when the funds are actually borrowed upon settlement. Typically, a trade is settled in 3 days from trade date (T+3).”

When I logon today, I saw a link to the August statement but nothing happens when I click on it. What gives? (I tried with both Firefox and IE).

When I get the statement, I will check to see if margin interest only accrues on day T+3 and report back. If this is true, I would be happy to revise my blog comparing Sogoinvest with Izone, as well as post another update on this issue.

Could Sogoinvest comment whether ACH-in money that is “held in escrow” can be used to offset margin interest? For example, if I have a $5000 margin but also $5000 held in escrow, do I pay margin interest on the $5000 margin?

If Sogoinvest’s new margin interest policy is what they said and their ACH timeline is revised successfully, I would be glad to send them more business.

Thanks.

If Sogo went T+3 on margin interest accrual date, I’d swap accounts now.

But I won’t unless/until they do.

Also, I assume Sogo will not be implementing streaming quotes?

Good discussion everyone. Thanks for the 411.

As of today(Monday 9/11/06) I still haven’t heard back from Sogoinvest Yet!!! It’s now been a week since I E-mailed Sogo. What I did was sent Sogoinvest ,Scottrade and Sharebuilder an E-mail (all within 20 mins.) to see which brokerage came through the fastest. SHAREBUILDER came in 1st.(1 day) Sogoinvest AND Scottrade still haven’t come through yet. Sharebuilder with over 1.2 million accounts still had the time to get back with me. That’s what I like to see!!!!(Just in case I really need them they’ll be there for answers when needed) I know there is a phone near by!!! You can really see where a brokerage’s weak point is when you deal with them alot, but with e-mails and phones, are 100% important to an account when the company is 850 miles away from my house. Then e-mail’s and phones are the most important to us, as online investors!! Vacman

P.S. I’m not saying that Sharebuilder is the best ,either,but they are right up there with the best brokerage’s on how well they handle things. Vacman

I just read Sogo’s “official response” above and I am glad to see they are paying attention to what everyone has to say. When a new company charges less for their services than the already established competitor, I expect the same quality if not better and so far Sogo seems to be keeping up with the challenge. I am going to test out there mentioned policy today. And I am waiting to hear about the update on the ACH timeline. Thanks for the great discussion.

Hi guys,

It appears that the new ACH timeline will go live tomorrow (9/15). An ACH submitted on day T will be posted on day T+2. In addition, margin interest does seem to accrue from day T+3. I posted the details HERE.

I must say I am quite impressed with Sogoinvest’s willingness to address the issues raised and I would be willing to continue more investments with them.

I forgot to close the quote on the link in my last post. HERE is the corrected link.

Thanks indexfundfan. Your research saves me a lot of time. Things have been smooth with the site lately. It seems that your repeated efforts at addressing thier quirks has paid off. You got their attention and luckily they took it seriously. I am a fairly new trader so listening to the lingo on these blogs is like a foriegn language to me. It helps to get me up to speed though. I’ll let you guys know if I come across any issues. You seem to get fast results.

I really like their Fractional Shares option. Not everyone has thousands of dollars to play with and this makes it possible for just about anyone to trade. I believe Sogoinvest is the only online trading site with this option. Their might be one other but I can’t recall which one. I know the big shots that also have account minimums don’t have this feature. Thanks Sogo for thinking about both the Big guy and the little guy to. Everyone should have a shot at making some extra money.

SM invest, The other companies are Sharebuilder.com,Mystockfund.com,Foliofn.com,Buyandhold.com and now Sogoinvest.com. They are all good companies(except one.!!!) I hope you like Sogoinvest . Let us know if you have any questions and troubles. bye for now. Vacman

Thanks Vacman. I will keep you posted. Sharebuilder was the one I was trying to remember. I didn’t realize there were so many others.

Hey,SM Invest and Grant, I just Emailed Sogoinvest and within 20 mins. they got back with me. THAT IS FAST RESPONSE TIME!!!!! I’m Very impressed with the latest improvement!!!! That’s what makes people want to do business with SOGO. I hope they keep it up. Remember the things we need from online brokers? After 10 days, I’m still waiting for a response from Scottrade?(and I even got an acoount with them) Maybe I’ll switch my IRA over to Sogoinvest when they come out with the IRA options.Bye for now, Vacman

Sogoinvest is good but one can not open IRA, on options, no ETFs…. Anybody tested Interactivebrokers yet? IB claims they are the lowest cost firm. Agree?

Thanks for the update Vacman. I have been making some good trades lately. One thing I love about stocks as opposed to Vegas is that if I screw up I just hold out until it rises again. It basically guaranteed to happen given the nature of the market.

Anyway, glad to see Sogo stepping their game up which seems to be a wise investment on my part. Grant you have a great thread going here. The best so far to get info on sogo from other customers just like me. Do you think they will make an official statemant soon about upcoming improvements or additions on the site? Keep us informed and keep up the the good work.

And thanks brightinvesting for the link to a new post about sogo. I am always interested to see what others have to say about them.

Hey Indexfundfan, Nice Blog. It really gives the whole experiance with Sogo right from the very start. You are realy keeping them in check. It is this same demand for excellence that proves a company has interests in serving its clients. Hopefully they will keep this attitude in the years to come.

You are realy keeping them in check.
Haha… thanks to the publicity generated, Grant’s access to the Sogoinvest’s chief, and the willingness of Sogoinvest to revise its policies, I think I can say that Sogoinvest is now a much better deal for investors. BTW, I have also resumed my investments with Sogoinvest.

There are still some of the promises that Sogoinvest needs to work on, like online ACH withdrawals, IRAs, mutual funds, etc. My wish list:

1) ability to revise limit order price in one step, not a cancel-and-resubmit.
2) acknowledge / support specific ID stock trades

Grant: Even Sogo does allow you to open IRAs. The cost is still much higher than IB unless you strictly use buy and hold strategy. In this new trading world, hold won’t make sense anymore. Therefore if you make a few trade every month. IB is still the lowest overall cost firm. Check and compare for youself.

indexfundfan,

When will sogo offer automatic dividend reinvestment
for the ETFs?

Thanks.

That is great news Grant. I appreciate you being the liaison between Sogo and the Blogisphere. All I have to do is visit your site for an update. It makes my life easier. Good work.

Grant, If Sogo does go with Div/reins, I’ll have to go ahead and open up an account. I don’t like Scottrade because of div/rein (not able) . I don’t mind paying $7.00 a trade (but if you want to rein. div. you have to pay $7.00)so to rein/vest div. you better have a dividend of $350.00 so the $7.00 won’t be more than 2% comm. cost!!!! I hope SOGO keeps improving!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Vacman .

I have an account since August and I am one of those who complained a lot to them Now I am quite happy with them.

Anyway, the few times I bought ETFs (all limit orders), I am quite satisfied, either getting my limit price at the market asking price or better. Incidentally, I already made a post on this:

Yet another post on Sogoinvest

Has anybody tried Zecco.com yet? Good ,bad etc.?Why? Etc. Thanks , Vacman

Grant, I’m like you. If i had to choose between Sogo and Zecco I would go with Sogoinvest for the SAME reasons you said. thanks for the attachment also!Vacman

Grant, go to indexfundfan web-site and read my last note about Zecco. I think it’s at, indextown.com???(i think) Vacman

I’m just reading this for the first time now, I notice there are comments saying sogo does not offer ACH out, but their FAQ says they do (under Funding Q&A), although there is a very weird restriction:

* Funds deposited into your SogoInvest account via electronic transfer can only be withdrawn via electronic transfer to the same bank account if the deposited funds have been in your SogoInvest account for less than 60 days.

So is this ACH out capability new? If so it’s a step in the right direction, although I wish they’d lift that restriction. I guess you could register two bank accounts with them and use one to deposit and one to withdraw but that’s a bit of a hassle.

Also I notice some comments saying you need to call them to withdraw, but the FAQ only mentions needing to mail or fax the appropriate form (which would depend on your method of withdrawal). So do you still need to call in to withdraw?

Brim, Everything has changed on the Sogoinvest ACH program within the last 10 days or so. ( they didn’t have ach out until lately,I think))They are really trying their best on this issue! If you are thinking about opening an account with Sogo I think they will try as hard as anybody else if you have a problem. Yes, you HAD to call them in the past to get money out. Maybe Indexfundfan or Grant have a more curremt answer for this one. Let us know if you have any insight with Sogoinvest. I’m thinking about opening up an account with them.Brim have a great weekend! Vacman

I just found this post from a link on
this site. Very interesting thread you guys have going on here. It is strange how everything connects in the blogisphere. I read one post and it leads to all of these others through a tunnel of blogs that has some sort of fluidity to it. I never even heard of Sogoinvest or this blog. Strange how ones search ends up. I wonder what other links on this thread lead to. The journey continues.

I have been w/ Sogo for a couple of months.

Good things:
1) Good execution time (except for two trades this past Monday)
2) Decent features

Annoying things:
1) 90 day $1 trial period is from the day you sign up online, not from the day you start trading. I thought that it would be from the time I sent in my forms to formally complete my sign-up process. $3/trade isn’t bad, though, but I’ll check out Zecco b/c $0/trade is better than $3/trade. Not saying I’ll switch, though.
2) From Grant’s initial interviews w/ the President (and from a few questions the past couple of months), the features of Roth IRA accounts and options are past schedule. Not cool!

Hello everybody, I wouldn’t try Zecco.com . Go over to their blog and read some of their blog. One guys is trying to show them that $600.oo is missing from his balance! He faxed his account history to prove that he should have $600.00 more and they said” everything is right”. They are having troubles with transfering ach’s. One guy after 16 days is still waiting for his deposit. If I would open an account I would go with Sogoinvest than Zecco! Reasons: 1. they seem to be really trying on every issue. #2.they are newer than Zecco #3. They do respond to their e-mails. #4.they do change their policy if customers demand changes.#5.They are owned by a bigger brokerage name.#6.$3.00 trade cost is almost free(over the whole year your total trade cost may only be $50.00 ,almost free,) I DON’T HAVE AN ACOOUNT WITH SOGO but IF I would need an brokerage account I would give them a try. They do seem like they are really giving their brokerage business a GOOD start. I think that there are better brokers out there but if you want almost free trades I would go with SOgo.Vacman

when they will offer GTC order and short sell?

This is a long thread. Is anyone who has posted a comment still reading it? it seems like you all had a nice exchange here. How is everyone feeling now about Sogoinvest’s service? BTW grant, nice work on keeping up with this giant blog. It must demand a decent amount of attention.

The problem I see with Zecco is their management. If you go to their website and read the bios of their management, not all of them mention what college they attended. This leads me to think that many of them did not attend college. In this day and age, that bothers me. Also, who did list their college did not attend any top ranked schools.

Nice interview. Unfortunately, having personal experience with SoGo Invest the last 4 months, I would warn anyone interested in trying it to proceed with EXTREME CAUTION.

My experience was terrible bordering on complete hell… not only was the account opening and funding process harrowing, but the trades were poorly executed. I have access to both a Scottrade account and a TDAmeritrade account, and did a comparison test. I placed the same limit orders through all three accounts for different stocks in different sectors on different days. On average, Scottrade executed with the best price, Ameritrade executed at limit, and SoGo expires without executing. The lack of “good til cancel” orders is a small drawback relative to their complete incompetence. Customer service is hellacious at best, although of the dozen or so representatives I’ve spoken to, there were two that actually gave me SOME level of help (although not nearly as much as was needed – excuses range from “the only person who handles that is on vacation” to “everyone is out to lunch”). What’s worst, the security of my files are in question, while talking to one customer service representative, I actually heard her walk somewhere, open a file cabnet to pull my paper file (in order to check my eligibility for electronic withdraw), bringing me to question whether my file (including my SSN) is safe or just widely accessable by random customer service representatives. Closing the account was an ABSOLUTE NIGHTMARE. I tried for over TWO months to exact all my funds.

I started out with electronic transfer, but that totally failed. They have all the appropriate forms, but never transferred my money and could not tell me why they were unable to execute the request. After nearly a month, all communications ceased from SoGo on the matter.

Next I tried paper check as the next option, and after another 6 weeks, half a dozen calls (which no one ever answers, I had to call Genesis to get someone), e-mails, and faxes, I finally got a check today.

I am not alone in my experience… I had made the unfortunate mistake of telling all my friends about this SoGo, and they all had problems of similar magnitude. It’s possible that over time they will get better, but I gotta say… go with Zecco… $0 trade, much better technology and slightly better customer service wins my vote. For the best customer service and best execution, I’d still go with Scottrade.

Sogo-Nogo, I see that in addition to my site, you have also added your feedback here. Besides your case, it seems like there is at least one more case of complaint with funds withdrawal that I am aware off.

Personally, I have not tried withdrawing money but I intend to try this out very soon when I receive the cash dividends from VWO. For a start, I have shot Sogoinvest an email asking them to explain the statement

“Online ACH requests are coming soon” (for withdrawals)

which has appeared on their website since August. I think this feature is way past due, and I can’t imagine what excuse they could have for the inability to implement a simple feature in four FULL months.

Indexfundfan and Grant. There are to many same issues with both persons reporting about withdrawing money from Sogo. I think they are the same person!(maybe)What REALLY throws a RED FLAG to me is Sogos’ response, Quote:”your check is in backlog” (Dec 23 : 23:45) If that really happened then that tells us REALLY what is currently going on at Sogo!!! Vacman