Charles Schwab Online Down for Hour

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Charles Schwab Online Down for Hour

Monday, August 30, 1999; 5:02 p.m. EDT

NEW YORK (AP) -- Charles Schwab customers were unable to buy or sell stock online for part of the day Monday because of computer troubles at the nation's largest discount brokerage.

Charles Schwab & Co. said its systems were down between 11 a.m. and noon Eastern time, though some customers reported having problems for longer periods of time in the afternoon.

Tracey Gordon, a company spokeswoman, said the cause of the problem was unknown. ``We're looking into it right now,'' she said.

The San Francisco-based company handles about 147,700 online trades a day for its 6.2 million active investor accounts.

Many customers swamped Internet chat rooms and message boards with notes of frustration.

``I've got pending orders that I can't get a status on. I have no idea what I have bought and sold or how much cash I have on hand,'' wrote ``jluchsin'' on a Yahoo! message board.

``The problem started over 4 hours ago,'' the message continued, ``I just filled out an application for Datek. Trades up to 5,000 shares for $9.95. (Schwab does 1,000 for $29.95) Also, they GUARANTEE their market orders placed in 60 seconds or they're free! If they work out, I'll move all of my accounts out of Schwab.''

Temporary outages are not uncommon among the competing online brokerages, and are usually fixed within a few hours. Most companies try to placate customers who are inconvenienced.

Charles Schwab charged customers the $29.95 online commission if they were forced to place their orders via telephone.

Shares of Charles Schwab fell $3, or 7 percent, to $38.25 on the New York Stock Exchange.

) Copyright 1999 The Associated Press

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-- Homer Beanfang (Bats@inbellfry.com), August 30, 1999

Answers

No wonder the stock market took a dive today, Charles Schwab customers couldn't get their buys and sells in.

-- stock watcher (stockwatcher@stockwatcherr.com), August 30, 1999.

YES, Schwab people couldnt get on so the market tanked over 100 points.

At least you didnt blame Y2k.

Having said that, why the hell is this message posted here ?. Dont these stock services crash now and then, why is it on TB2000?

-- sell sell (sellsell@dumpitall.now), August 30, 1999.


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