For those about to enter the Philippine Stock Market, try to search for online brokers other than COL Financial because in COL lag is real.
The first year my husband and I started on stocks, we were so happy with COL, we even recommend, advocate to friends and family to join PSEI thru COL. But in 2019 and 2020, there had been lots of instances of lags and down server.
If you checked the Facebook Page of COL, you will read the frustrations of stock traders in the comments sections. Lots of trades not executed on time due to system lag or server downtime. Can’t access the website of COL Financial right now, so frustrating.
I highly suggest to look for existing customers feedbacks on the broker you are considering. Hopefully you’ll be able to find an online stock broker which is way better than COL.
If your plan is to buy stocks and hold for long term, COL Financial is okay I think. If you plan to do Peso Cost Averaging on a stock, COL is okay. But if the plan is to actively trade, look elsewhere.
Their platform has failed many traders including ourselves especially last year and alas, this year too. Will this continue on for the rest of 2021? Hoping not.
COL Financial Please Upgrade Your Platform
For a big company dealing in PSEI, COL’s system right now is so much wanting. They should update, do real upgrade to their platform so clients’ trades will be executed on time and properly.
I’ve noticed that usually during price breakaways of a stock or new stock offerings, COL’s platform experiences super lag or one can’t access the website due to server down. Like now January 5, 2020.
A lot of clients have made known their frustrations to management thru the Facebook page for months now but alas, until now it seems like no real changes has been made to update and upgrade the system.
A great stock online trading platform have to be fast, it needs to be able to handle hundreds of thousands of clients simultaneously accessing the website at the same time without hiccups. The management has to be active too in handling and addressing customer concerns.
Failed Sell Order Cancellation Due to Lag
Last November, I shared about PHA trading at price P0.53. Bought few thousands shares that time. Then last December I set a sell order GTC, good for 60 days, at P1.35. Yesterday I was monitoring PHA, it traded as high as P1.34, closed the day at P1.32.
This morning I have every intention to cancel the GTC Sell Order the moment the market opens because my expectation is that the price will still go up and I want to still hold that particular number of stocks.
9:15 AM I was already ready, was logged-in to the COL Financial platform. I was already on the Trading page, with the mouse ready to hit the ‘Cancel’ button the moment the PSEI opens. The first time I clicked on the ‘Cancel’ button, no response on the platform. So I did it again, it went through and I was able to paste my password. I checked back on ‘Home’ then ‘Portfolio’ but so much lag, I can’t open the pages quickly.
After sometime, I was able to load ‘Portfolio’ page and sadly, our PHA position decreased. The GTC Sell Order was executed; I believe it shouldn’t have been had there been no lag in the COL Financial platform.
The highest price of PHA stock today is 1.46, PSEI is still open so this is not yet the closing price.
Clients of COL like us still can’t access the platform, their website is inaccessible, 502 bad gateway, down server as of the time I am writing this. They have posted an Advisory on their Facebook page about encountering ‘technical issues’. Go to the FB page and read more client feedback on this company.
Frustrating COL. Utterly frustrating. Lagi nalang.
Do you have suggestions of a great stock broker platform to transfer to? We are starting to liquidate our stock holdings thru COL Financial and are very appreciative for inputs or feedbacks on other stock brokers dealing in PSEI.
If COL Financial will not upgrade and overhaul their online stock and mutual fund platform as soon as possible, a good number of existing clients will most likely exit their company.
COL attend to the feedbacks of your customers, please. More importantly, do something about your platform. It needs tremendous improvement.
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