This week, the stock trading app Robinhood experienced a total of three outages. Amidst fears of a recession after a particularly steep decline in the stock market this week, it’s certainly not the biggest news in finance. Robinhood Cash Management comes with an optional debit card. However, if you’ve been affected by the Robinhood outage then you’ll want to know what to do about it before any lawsuit happens.
Your first order of action is not to panic. With market changes and coronavirus concerns, the last thing you’ll want to do now is to add more fuel to the fire. Staying updated on further changes is the route to take. We’re here to help you make sense of the Robinhood outage status and the effects it’s had on its users.
How to check is the Robinhood Trading App Down?
The easiest way to check if the Robinhood app is down is to visit Robinhood Status. It’s the app’s own personal status site and it will tell you whether or not they’re currently experiencing problems. This is the first step you should take in assessing the situation.
Go to the Robinhood login page. Make sure it’s not your own WiFi or internet connection first, or that there’s not something wrong with your account specifically. If your connection and account both seem to be working fine then you at least know it’s not a problem specific to you.
A site like Down Detector won’t be as accurate as the actual Robinhood website. But, it makes it easy to see what kinds of problems others are having with the app. You can see when others reported problems, what the issue was, and how many people in total experienced the same issue. The Live Outage map also makes it easy to see where people are having the most issues.
What is Robinhood Doing About the Outages?
After the three outages that occurred this week, Robinhood has released statements saying that they’ll compensate investors that were affected by the outage. But, it’ll be on a case-by-case basis. It’s currently unclear what kind of case they might deem suitable for recompensation.
When the first outage occurred, the Robinhood app was offline the entire day from 6:30 am to 11 pm PST. Then, another outage occurred on March 9th from 6:30 am to just about 9 am PST.
TechCrunch reported that when Robinhood first made statements about the outage, they said that they would “provide compensation to all customers of its Robinhood Gold premium subscription for borrowing money to trade plus access to Morningstar research reports, Nasdaq data, and bigger instant deposits. It’s offering them three months of service.”
Is this fair? It depends on how you look at it. A normal Robinhood Gold membership costs $5 plus a yearly interest of 5% for members who borrow more than $1,000 to trading. So, while members will save roughly $5 per month, they’re missing out on whatever they could have earned during the outage.
While this wouldn’t normally be a big deal, the outage just so happened to coincide with major changes in the stock markets. This past Monday, Apple stocks went up over 9%, for example. On March 2nd, the outage occurred coincidentally on the day the Dow saw its biggest point gain in history.
How to Contact Robinhood About the Outage
So, what do you really need to do if you were affected by the Robinhood outage? You’ll want to simply get in touch with them through this page. Because they’re handling this on a case by case basis, you’ll find that it’s easiest to just get in touch and ask about compensation.
Overall, 10 million users were reported as being affected by the outage. And, it’s caused Robinhood to receive its first formal lawsuit. It was filed on March 4th in the U.S. District Court in Tampa, Florida. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages of which you’re likely entitled to as a user.
However, the easiest route to take is still to get in touch about your specific case. They might give it to you and they might not, but you’ll never know if you don’t ask.
Recuperating Cash in Other Ways
If you lost money due to the Robinhood outage or missed out on major investments, there are other ways in which you can recuperate some cash. Or, there are other ways in which you ensure you’re earning a passive income without having to invest in stocks and use trading apps.
With the help of a Cheese Debit Card, for example, you can save while making purchases. This debit card is 100% free: no overdraft fee, no monthly fee, no ATM fee etc. For every purchase you make, you can get cashback; with saving bonus, you’ll be able to save more each year or even put it back into stocks. It’s a win-win no matter how you look at it. Join Cheese Now!