938 views
New Reviewer
Resolved
3 comments
stars-rating-full stars-rating-full stars-rating-full stars-rating-full stars-rating-full
1.0
Updated by user Mar 26, 2017

I decided not to file a formal complaint. I do think that E.J should not be in the business of managing people's money, particularly the old and the naive.

They need to market themselves as what they are: a sales company to sell certain types of investments.

They will never be fiduciaries. Their antics have cost me my health.

Original review posted by user Mar 24, 2017

I have experienced nothing but grief from EJ. I have (or had) 1.3 million invested with them.

Now it's 1.1 million, in an up market. I did take some income, which EJ is always glad to point out. However, $100,000 in an up market is unaccounted for. Some of that was due to performance: I lost 13 percent when everyone else lost one percent.

Who knows what the rest is comprised of. Let's see...over the past 4 years: extensive churning, even after I put a no trading order in effect; advisory solutions which was never rebalanced once the market started to go up. It gained three percent during a year when the market was up 22 percent; money put into oil wells, ostensibly for income; advisors (including my family one) who bull *** me about "how every investment was a gem;" and now, get his: a trainee was handed my entire million to cut her teeth on. So, the fun was just beginning.

In six months, the trainee has handled $2,000 worth in a stock trade. First, she deducted $2,000 from my money market. Then, after hours on the phone with customer service, she put it back. Then, she deducted the $2,000 again, ostensibly to pay down my margin loan.

Then she was told to put that money back into my money market. I also told her to turn on the systematic sales of stock to help provide income. This was done before, by my first advisor, with little difficulty. This time, I had to hold her hand through the process.

She didn't even know enough to look at the way it had been done before. Now, it's been turned on, but, funny thing...the stocks are being sold, but nothing has made it into my money market, even after two weeks. I have asked her about this a couple of times. She finally threw up her hands, told me home office had told her everything was ok, and to get off her back because she had better things to do like give her other accounts exemplary service.

(Read, she had to get back to her door-knocking). So, I talked to finra. They told me to go to her manager and get everything straightened out. Funny, her manager is not available for comment.

Now the trainee is complaining that I am too much overhead, and she wants to fire me. Unilaterally. She doesn't even know how to file the paperwork to rebalance the advisory solutions account, and I am taking too much of her time??? Will wonders never cease.

What's a consumer to do? Well, first off, I don't really have much of a back up plan. I have talked to "fiduciaries" outside of EJ, but all of them raise red flags, and all seem a bit seedy. They all talk about how overregulated the business is, but I am seeing nothing but greed, what one money manager said was "legalized stealing." I have been invited by Schwab and Fidelity to move everything over "in kind." That's not a bad idea, but where do I go from there?

It's a lot of money. As I have found out through my experiences at EJ, a lot of money hanging around in an account is fair game for "fiduciaries" to steal...er, I mean invest. Recently, I found out that Schwab assigns sums over a certain amount to a managed account, probably managed by an *** who charges a 1 percent wrap fee, then takes it from there. In short, I have no one to trust my money to.

At this point, I'm an almost millionaire, looking to get rich again. Does anyone have any viable alternatives?

I have been trying out other wire houses, doing it on my own with small sums of money. I have found that, without the middle man, I am making a tidy sum of money just putting money into a robo advisor.

Reason of review: Poor customer service.

Location: 1040 University Ave B211, San Diego, CA 92103, USA

Do You Have Something To Say ?
Write a review

Comments

chat-icon

Please avoid publishing any personal information and promotional content

You will be automatically registered on our site. Username and password will be sent to you via email.
Post Comment
Guest

get similar problem with so much money . they refuse to give me my money back i call they don't answer i e-mail they deleted it .

i am an elderly person and i am scared. That happened in one of offices in las Vegas.the financial adviser is a young woman very fresh and min

Guest

I'm in the same situation you are and am transferring to Vanguard. With your balances, they will offer you guidance and the fees to move money around are so much more reasonable.

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-1315431

Suzanne,I finally moved everything over to Fidelity, to a self-managed account. It's safe for now.

Even with the market ups and downs, it is doing so much better; I'm not losing money hand over fist any more. It's not being churned for commissions. I was assigned a broker by Fidelity. I hope he is not getting commissions.

Overall, my life is more peaceful. I don't have to worry about my E.J. sales person calling me several times per day to sell me products. No one has exchanged my low-cost index funds for oil and gas pipelines.Ultimately, do I want to manage this amount of money on my own?

It's stomach churning, and it takes a lot of time. I wish I could find a true fiduciary.

Edward Jones Reviews

  1. 53 reviews
  2. 13 reviews
  3. 2 reviews
  4. 4 reviews
  5. 1 review
Edward Jones reviews