Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

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texasdiver
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Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by texasdiver »

I don't know if anyone else experienced this. This past weekend I tried to help my young daughter open up a new Vanguard Roth IRA account. The web site was glitching and we got all the way through the new account information page, tediously entering all her information and then it crashed. Tried with Chrome and Edge so wasn't our browser. Tried again today and same result. Apparently Vanguard doesn't want her new account.

So we flipped over to Fidelity and it all went seamlessly and I discovered that Fidelity has 4 zero-fee index funds. So daughter is now the new proud owner of a new Roth IRA holding FZROK. She is 18 and will now probably be with Fidelity for the rest of her life. Vanguard's loss I guess. Little things like this can have a life-long effect.
exodusNH
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by exodusNH »

texasdiver wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:55 pm I don't know if anyone else experienced this. This past weekend I tried to help my young daughter open up a new Vanguard Roth IRA account. The web site was glitching and we got all the way through the new account information page, tediously entering all her information and then it crashed. Tried with Chrome and Edge so wasn't our browser. Tried again today and same result. Apparently Vanguard doesn't want her new account.

So we flipped over to Fidelity and it all went seamlessly and I discovered that Fidelity has 4 zero-fee index funds. So daughter is now the new proud owner of a new Roth IRA holding FZROK. She is 18 and will now probably be with Fidelity for the rest of her life. Vanguard's loss I guess. Little things like this can have a life-long effect.
Just don't hold those zero ER funds in taxable, since they're not portable to other brokerages. You'd need to liquidate, paying capital gains, to get out of those funds.
mr_brightside
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by mr_brightside »

i've mentioned this previously but we recently opened a couple IRAs with T Rowe Price for this reason.

can stay with Vanguard (longstanding) but - yeah - the IT / service is not superb.

-----------------------------------
livesoft
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by livesoft »

texasdiver wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:55 pm.... Tried with Chrome and Edge so wasn't our browser. Tried again today and same result. Apparently Vanguard doesn't want her new account.
Your daughter may have 5 Roth IRAs now: one at Fidelity, two Edgy ones at Vanguard and another two Chrome-y ones at Vanguard.
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jebmke
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by jebmke »

The forum is filled with VG complaint threads so you are not alone.

Perhaps they could all be consolidated into the mother of all VG complaint threads.
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JoMoney
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by JoMoney »

I haven't been with Vanguard for going on two years now (I'm at Fidelity.)
I never had any issues with Vanguard, they never were big on "frills", I would have said that I wouldn't hesitate to go back to Vanguard if I was unhappy with my current broker, but with some of the complaints I've been reading recently I'm not so sure that's the case any more.
Coupled with the fact that I can no longer get a straight mutual-fund custodian account with Vanguard (only brokerage account), there's even less of a reason to use them. The only reason I can think of that would make Vanguard more compelling to me is if the Money Market funds were back to paying interest like in the past, and Vanguard's lower cost gave them an edge for cash holdings.
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ruralavalon
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by ruralavalon »

texasdiver wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:55 pm I don't know if anyone else experienced this. This past weekend I tried to help my young daughter open up a new Vanguard Roth IRA account. The web site was glitching and we got all the way through the new account information page, tediously entering all her information and then it crashed. Tried with Chrome and Edge so wasn't our browser. Tried again today and same result. Apparently Vanguard doesn't want her new account.

So we flipped over to Fidelity and it all went seamlessly and I discovered that Fidelity has 4 zero-fee index funds. So daughter is now the new proud owner of a new Roth IRA holding FZROK. She is 18 and will now probably be with Fidelity for the rest of her life. Vanguard's loss I guess. Little things like this can have a life-long effect.
I have never experienced any problems with Vanguard, and feel bad for those that have.

I posted because I just wanted to say it's great that you got your 18-year old daughter off to a good start, and I'm sure the Roth IRA at Fidelity using Fidelity ZERO Total Market Index Fund (FZROX) will be great for her.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by jebmke »

JoMoney wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 8:23 am but with some of the complaints I've been reading recently I'm not so sure that's the case any more.
Without knowing what the base rate is it is hard to tell. If VG has a lot more customers than in the past, even if their case-rate stays constant one would expect to see more complaints. Without aggregate data, there is no way to draw objective conclusions about whether things are better/worse or the same. I have no opinion one way or another because I have no data.
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Wiggums
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by Wiggums »

My son is opening his first IRA. It’s nice to see young people getting an early start.
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ruralavalon
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by ruralavalon »

jebmke wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 8:31 am
JoMoney wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 8:23 am but with some of the complaints I've been reading recently I'm not so sure that's the case any more.
Without knowing what the base rate is it is hard to tell. If VG has a lot more customers than in the past, even if their case-rate stays constant one would expect to see more complaints. Without aggregate data, there is no way to draw objective conclusions about whether things are better/worse or the same. I have no opinion one way or another because I have no data.
+ 1 .

Its hard to evaluate any large operation based on anecdotes. I can't know what is typical that way.

My own experience may, or may not, be typical.

When I see posts about the Vanguard website or app being down, I usually login to see, and it always works when I check it out. (Perhaps it was broken and they fixed it by the time I got there, perhaps it was never broken, I don't know.)

On a forum with a majority of Vanguard users, most complaints will probably be from that core of Vanguard users.

Surveys or polls can be more informative, but will not be random samples either.

Vanguard has experienced a large influx of new customers, who may have different or unreasonable expectations about customer service and Information Technology issues.

I sometimes feel it's unreasonable to expect a good fund firm to also be a good bank, good brokerage, and a good investment advisor.

I just don't know what to make of these frequent posts about issues at Vanguard.
Last edited by ruralavalon on Thu Sep 23, 2021 9:00 am, edited 1 time in total.
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jebmke
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by jebmke »

ruralavalon wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 8:49 am I just don't know what to make of these frequent posts about issues at Vanguard.
I don’t doubt that the anecdotes are probably mostly real specific issues. One advantage of a consolidated thread would be that people could see if others have a similar issue that has a resolution in subsequent posts. With multiple threads you have to search and examine each one.
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bondsr4me
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by bondsr4me »

jebmke wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 8:21 am The forum is filled with VG complaint threads so you are not alone.

Perhaps they could all be consolidated into the mother of all VG complaint threads.
+1

that would be the mother-load of all threads!

but you have a very good idea.
fwellimort
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by fwellimort »

Congratulations!
Just make sure in a taxable account, to buy ETFs instead like:
US: VTI/ITOT/SCHB/SPTM
International: VXUS/IXUS
in partial shares.

Don't buy zero funds on a taxable account. In an IRA, zero funds are fantastic.

I too gave up on Vanguard (but for different reasons). Vanguard at the time was constantly spamming my e-mails about PAS and I grew sick and tired of it.
Vanguard has great funds but its customer service recently has declined hard and it has been advertising fee products far more than other brokerages.
Good thing is you can always get those great Vanguard funds in any brokerage as forms of ETFs. And at Fidelity, you can purchase partial shares of those ETFs :).

Fidelity also has Cash Management and a decent credit card (with high credit limit). Cash Management with its unlimited free ATM withdrawals domestically is quite nice (and you get your paycheck a day earlier than most big banks) and the Fidelity 2% credit card is quite decent as a starter.
H-Town
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by H-Town »

texasdiver wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:55 pm I don't know if anyone else experienced this. This past weekend I tried to help my young daughter open up a new Vanguard Roth IRA account. The web site was glitching and we got all the way through the new account information page, tediously entering all her information and then it crashed. Tried with Chrome and Edge so wasn't our browser. Tried again today and same result. Apparently Vanguard doesn't want her new account.

So we flipped over to Fidelity and it all went seamlessly and I discovered that Fidelity has 4 zero-fee index funds. So daughter is now the new proud owner of a new Roth IRA holding FZROK. She is 18 and will now probably be with Fidelity for the rest of her life. Vanguard's loss I guess. Little things like this can have a life-long effect.
I expect Vanguard to never recover from this! lol Surely it's just small beans. $6k today or $600k 20 years later, still small beans to Vanguard.

Just look at it as a win or a loss to your daughter. A win for sure, since she started her savings at 18. Just need to automate the savings and she'll be multi-millionaire in no time. Doesn't matter she holds her accounts at Vanguard, or Fidelity, or both.
Time is the ultimate currency.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by ruralavalon »

fwellimort wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 9:11 amDon't buy zero funds on a taxable account. In an IRA, zero funds are fantastic.
In an IRA ZERO funds are blah!! They are a marketing and advertising triumph for Fidelity.

But so far the ER of 0.00% has not produced any benefit for the customer. Portfolio Visualizer, 1999-2021. The tiny differences in expense ratios have been meaningless so far.
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H-Town
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by H-Town »

ruralavalon wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 9:31 am
fwellimort wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 9:11 amDon't buy zero funds on a taxable account. In an IRA, zero funds are fantastic.
In an IRA ZERO funds are blah!! They are a marketing and advertising triumph for Fidelity.

But so far the ER of 0.00% has not produced any benefit for the customer, a little lower Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) with a little higher volatility.Portfolio Visualizer, 1999-2021. The tiny differences in expense ratios have been meaningless so far.
Let's see if my math is right:
1) With Vanguard, 3 basis point for $6,000 investment: 1 dollar and 80 cents (annual cost)
2) With Fidelity: 0 expense

Tracking error in a single trading day seems to have more impact than 3 basis points.
Time is the ultimate currency.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by tibbitts »

texasdiver wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:55 pm So we flipped over to Fidelity and it all went seamlessly and I discovered that Fidelity has 4 zero-fee index funds. So daughter is now the new proud owner of a new Roth IRA holding FZROK. She is 18 and will now probably be with Fidelity for the rest of her life. Vanguard's loss I guess. Little things like this can have a life-long effect.
I don't think it was a great example to just "discover" an option then and then invest in it immediately. As other comments have indicated there are some pros and cons to zero funds (although some are specific to taxable accounts) that aren't obvious, and they aren't necessarily a better alternative even relative to other Fidelity funds.
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goingup
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by goingup »

It's disappointing to hear time and again (from veteran BH posters) how incompetent Vanguard has become. I no longer recommend them to new investors. My own experiences with Vanguard are satisfactory but I'll migrate to Schwab if an exit becomes necessary.
Nver2Late
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by Nver2Late »

texasdiver wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:55 pm I don't know if anyone else experienced this. This past weekend I tried to help my young daughter open up a new Vanguard Roth IRA account. The web site was glitching and we got all the way through the new account information page, tediously entering all her information and then it crashed.
We had a similar experience earlier this year. It crashed setting up a Roth for/with my adult child (I know - oxymoron, but still no less true). It crashed before setting up a user name/password so the reset function would not work since it required an account number which we didn't yet have. So I did a secure PM on my account and Vanguard responded with have Child call the 800 number. Well it took several months to get Child to sit down with me to set it up, so I knew getting them to take the time to wait on hold was a no-go. So we waited and luckily by the end of the week, a snail mail with an account number showed up. Now armed with the account number, we could finish the set up and all is good.
"Better is the enemy of good." Good is good.
mrjohnanderson007
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by mrjohnanderson007 »

I have vanguard. If I switched to another brokerage then that brokerage will probably go down hill and vanguard will get their act together. Then I will want to switch back. So I'll stay at vanguard until I have a problem with them.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by bondsr4me »

mrjohnanderson007 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 10:48 am So I'll stay at vanguard until I have a problem with them.
I agree with that....nobody should change brokerages unless they have had problems with that broker.

We all know Vanguard has problems (as all do) and seems to be on a slide down.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by bgvg »

If something like this happens, it wouldn’t hurt to let Vanguard know so they’re at least aware of it and can have someone look into fixing it.

Many people try and give up without reporting these kind of problems.

Maybe people just aren’t complaining enough directly to Vanguard.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by 8foot7 »

bgvg wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 11:15 am If something like this happens, it wouldn’t hurt to let Vanguard know so they’re at least aware of it and can have someone look into fixing it.

Many people try and give up without reporting these kind of problems.

Maybe people just aren’t complaining enough directly to Vanguard.
There are plenty of affordable solutions, and plenty of ways to do low-budget status monitoring using free tools, on the market today that can monitor a change in the pattern of results for an application. If Vanguard cared enough about maintaining uptime on the application, they'd invest in these. This is not a hard problem in IT. Expecting potential customers to function as downtime notifiers is a foolish strategy.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by KyleAAA »

8foot7 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 12:07 pm
bgvg wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 11:15 am If something like this happens, it wouldn’t hurt to let Vanguard know so they’re at least aware of it and can have someone look into fixing it.

Many people try and give up without reporting these kind of problems.

Maybe people just aren’t complaining enough directly to Vanguard.
There are plenty of affordable solutions, and plenty of ways to do low-budget status monitoring using free tools, on the market today that can monitor a change in the pattern of results for an application. If Vanguard cared enough about maintaining uptime on the application, they'd invest in these. This is not a hard problem in IT. Expecting potential customers to function as downtime notifiers is a foolish strategy.
LOL

Every SaaS shop I've ever worked for would beg to differ that this isn't a hard problem. It's very, very hard and tooling is the opposite of cheap.
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8foot7
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by 8foot7 »

KyleAAA wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 12:11 pm
8foot7 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 12:07 pm
bgvg wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 11:15 am If something like this happens, it wouldn’t hurt to let Vanguard know so they’re at least aware of it and can have someone look into fixing it.

Many people try and give up without reporting these kind of problems.

Maybe people just aren’t complaining enough directly to Vanguard.
There are plenty of affordable solutions, and plenty of ways to do low-budget status monitoring using free tools, on the market today that can monitor a change in the pattern of results for an application. If Vanguard cared enough about maintaining uptime on the application, they'd invest in these. This is not a hard problem in IT. Expecting potential customers to function as downtime notifiers is a foolish strategy.
LOL

Every SaaS shop I've ever worked for would beg to differ that this isn't a hard problem. It's very, very hard and tooling is the opposite of cheap.
Cool. Different experiences.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by UpperNwGuy »

JoMoney wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 8:23 am The only reason I can think of that would make Vanguard more compelling to me is if the Money Market funds were back to paying interest like in the past, and Vanguard's lower cost gave them an edge for cash holdings.
This is a very good reason not to close a Vanguard account. In normal times, nobody does money market funds like Vanguard does money market funds. (They also do a better job with national level municipal bond funds than anyone else — the actively managed ones that don't have ETF equivalents.)
runninginvestor
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by runninginvestor »

fwellimort wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 9:11 am Congratulations!
Just make sure in a taxable account, to buy ETFs instead like:
US: VTI/ITOT/SCHB/SPTM
International: VXUS/IXUS
in partial shares.

Don't buy zero funds on a taxable account. In an IRA, zero funds are fantastic.

I too gave up on Vanguard (but for different reasons). Vanguard at the time was constantly spamming my e-mails about PAS and I grew sick and tired of it.
Vanguard has great funds but its customer service recently has declined hard and it has been advertising fee products far more than other brokerages.
Good thing is you can always get those great Vanguard funds in any brokerage as forms of ETFs. And at Fidelity, you can purchase partial shares of those ETFs :).

Fidelity also has Cash Management and a decent credit card (with high credit limit). Cash Management with its unlimited free ATM withdrawals domestically is quite nice (and you get your paycheck a day earlier than most big banks) and the Fidelity 2% credit card is quite decent as a starter.
Just a PSA about the PAS and digi-advisor emails for others who may encounter this: at the end of the email there's an address to tell them to stop sending them to you. I did this a few months ago, haven't received one since.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by GaryA505 »

I'm surprised so many people fall for the Fidelity Zero marketing trick. I believe Fidelity can offer this this for two reasons - 1) These funds only pay dividends semi-annually, so I think they are making money on the cash, and 2) They don't use the same indexes as Vanguard does, which may save them a little.

In any case, how they do it doesn't matter because there is no significant difference in the overall gain over time. See for yourself:

https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/bac ... ion2_2=100
Get most of it right and don't make any big mistakes. All else being equal, simpler is better. Simple is as simple does.
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Sage16
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by Sage16 »

Our brokerage and retirement accounts are at Vanguard and they are invested in 100% Vanguard ETF's or mutual funds. We are long time Vanguard customers and for the most part haven't had any problems with them over the years. Although from time to time it seems like they make things harder to do than they should be.

Earlier this week both my wife and I received letters from Vanguard saying that I had removed my wife as an agent from my Roth IRA. I don't recall touching the account so I setup a call with my Flagship rep and asked about it. He checked with someone and then told me she was never setup as an agent on that account. So why the letter? They did have a record from a few years ago when I had made her an agent on my other accounts open at the time. So I asked can you just update the account to add her as an agent on the Roth. Nope. They have to email me a form to fill out, get notarized and "mail" back. No DocuSign online option just old fashion mail in. Since we have our HSA with Fidelity, I wonder if the local Fidelity office would notarize the Vanguard form for me so I can mail it back to Vanguard?

Recently I had another experience with Vanguard that required me to print forms and mail in and I have started to wonder if we should move our accounts from Vanguard, it seems like they are stuck in the old ways and Fidelity and Schwab are making the user experience, both online and with local offices, so much easier to do business with them and with more features. Something for us to carefully think through before acting.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by nalor511 »

GaryA505 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 2:02 pm I'm surprised so many people fall for the Fidelity Zero marketing trick. I believe Fidelity can offer this this for two reasons - 1) These funds only pay dividends semi-annually, so I think they are making money on the cash, and 2) They don't use the same indexes as Vanguard does, which may save them a little.

In any case, how they do it doesn't matter because there is no significant difference in the overall gain over time. See for yourself:

https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/bac ... ion2_2=100
You can invest in Vanguard ETFs at Fidelity and get Fidelity's excellent service with Vanguard's excellent funds management, and have the best of both

You do not have to deal (suffer) with Vanguard's "customer service"
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by mervinj7 »

GaryA505 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 2:02 pm I'm surprised so many people fall for the Fidelity Zero marketing trick. I believe Fidelity can offer this this for two reasons - 1) These funds only pay dividends semi-annually, so I think they are making money on the cash, and 2) They don't use the same indexes as Vanguard does, which may save them a little.
Reason 1 is fundamentally wrong. The dividends are not held in cash until distributed. They are invested in the fund. You can look at the monthly holdings before and after the distribution to see the percentage of cash.

You can take a look at an earlier forum discussion regarding this common misconception on how mutual funds in general "hold" dividends.

viewtopic.php?p=4827032#p4827032

You can also look how even VTSAX uses futures to offset the cash drag of their cash holdings.
viewtopic.php?p=4827458#p4827458
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by PinotGris »

Another long time customer of Vanguard. In all those years i had one disappointing customer rep but since then i have had excellent service. The rep we had for almost 3 years now moved on and i only know the new rep by her photo that appears on my page. Usually the new rep makes an introductory phone call and we exchanged pleasantries. None of that now but i just go straight to anyone who responds to the phone call and have had excellent service.
The one time Vanguard goofed by not withholding taxes on our RMD , they made up for it more than adequately.
We switched my husband’s 401k account and rolled it over to Vanguard. I never liked dealing with Fidelity.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by GaryA505 »

mervinj7 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 5:14 pm
GaryA505 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 2:02 pm I'm surprised so many people fall for the Fidelity Zero marketing trick. I believe Fidelity can offer this this for two reasons - 1) These funds only pay dividends semi-annually, so I think they are making money on the cash, and 2) They don't use the same indexes as Vanguard does, which may save them a little.
Reason 1 is fundamentally wrong. The dividends are not held in cash until distributed. They are invested in the fund. You can look at the monthly holdings before and after the distribution to see the percentage of cash.

You can take a look at an earlier forum discussion regarding this common misconception on how mutual funds in general "hold" dividends.

viewtopic.php?p=4827032#p4827032

You can also look how even VTSAX uses futures to offset the cash drag of their cash holdings.
viewtopic.php?p=4827458#p4827458
Doesn't really matter though. The end result is the same, as shown in PV.
Get most of it right and don't make any big mistakes. All else being equal, simpler is better. Simple is as simple does.
mervinj7
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by mervinj7 »

GaryA505 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 8:40 pm
mervinj7 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 5:14 pm
GaryA505 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 2:02 pm I'm surprised so many people fall for the Fidelity Zero marketing trick. I believe Fidelity can offer this this for two reasons - 1) These funds only pay dividends semi-annually, so I think they are making money on the cash, and 2) They don't use the same indexes as Vanguard does, which may save them a little.
Reason 1 is fundamentally wrong. The dividends are not held in cash until distributed. They are invested in the fund. You can look at the monthly holdings before and after the distribution to see the percentage of cash.

You can take a look at an earlier forum discussion regarding this common misconception on how mutual funds in general "hold" dividends.

viewtopic.php?p=4827032#p4827032

You can also look how even VTSAX uses futures to offset the cash drag of their cash holdings.
viewtopic.php?p=4827458#p4827458
Doesn't really matter though. The end result is the same, as shown in PV.
All PV shows is that's it's very close, usually within 3 basis points of each other. For example, here's a period I picked where the ZERO funds "beats" VTSAX. I hold both funds and and until an year ago, the ZERO fund had a very small lead based on the one day I bought the fund. That doesn't necessarily mean one is better than the other.

https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/bac ... ion2_2=100
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texasdiver
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by texasdiver »

GaryA505 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 2:02 pm I'm surprised so many people fall for the Fidelity Zero marketing trick. I believe Fidelity can offer this this for two reasons - 1) These funds only pay dividends semi-annually, so I think they are making money on the cash, and 2) They don't use the same indexes as Vanguard does, which may save them a little.
From what I have read, this is only true if you are having dividends paid out in cash to another account. If you are reinvesting dividends like most people do with an IRA then they are reinvested as they are received like in any other mutual fund.

In any event, with her just starting out with a Roth IRA at age 18 the differences between Vanguard and Fidelity are trivial. It's just that Vanguard wouldn't let us actually open an account so that made the decision easy. I didn't see the point in finding a different Fidelity index fund that had higher fees when they had a zero fee fund that was what we wanted anyway. She's not locked in. She can swap it for any other Fidelity fund down the road if she wants.
smectym
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by smectym »

bondsr4me wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 11:03 am
mrjohnanderson007 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 10:48 am So I'll stay at vanguard until I have a problem with them.
I agree with that....nobody should change brokerages unless they have had problems with that broker.

We all know Vanguard has problems (as all do) and seems to be on a slide down.
Sticking with Vanguard as well—at least in the product lines they haven’t abandoned yet—but as puzzled as most at the “slide down.” Not privy to their spreadsheets, but I doubt that introducing 24/7 customer service (CS), stepping up the training of current CS, hiring 2,000 more CS, and related infrastructure moves, would crush their business model. Yes, it would be costly: but there must be more to it than that. Their competitors treat such costs as a fact of competitive life.
tomsense76
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by tomsense76 »

texasdiver wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:55 pm I don't know if anyone else experienced this. This past weekend I tried to help my young daughter open up a new Vanguard Roth IRA account. The web site was glitching and we got all the way through the new account information page, tediously entering all her information and then it crashed. Tried with Chrome and Edge so wasn't our browser. Tried again today and same result. Apparently Vanguard doesn't want her new account.

So we flipped over to Fidelity and it all went seamlessly and I discovered that Fidelity has 4 zero-fee index funds. So daughter is now the new proud owner of a new Roth IRA holding FZROK. She is 18 and will now probably be with Fidelity for the rest of her life. Vanguard's loss I guess. Little things like this can have a life-long effect.
Good job on getting her setup with Roth! :D

When I started out my Dad also helped me open a Roth. I think he was initially looking at Vanguard, but there were account minimums that would have been impractical. So he set me up with Fidelity. There was not the same selection of low cost funds, target date funds, etc. as there are today and so we went with FFNOX. Was a happy camper for a while until they tacked on some fees for accounts below some threshold. I don't recall what the threshold was and for various reasons wouldn't meet that requirement. So moved it out of there as fast as I could to a different provider. Fast-forward several years and a couple more moves (for various reasons) I'm now back at Fidelity. They have since gotten rid of the policy I didn't like. Plus the account is bigger (so less likely to run afoul of a similar constraint in the future). Right now I'm mostly happy with them (they'd did urk me with how they handled some tax forms not that long ago, but not bad enough to leave).

Morale of the story every provider can and does screw up eventually. Also just because one sets up an account at a particular provider hardly means they will stay there for life.
"Anyone who claims to understand quantum theory is either lying or crazy" -- Richard Feynman
tomsense76
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by tomsense76 »

texasdiver wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 12:09 am
GaryA505 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 2:02 pm I'm surprised so many people fall for the Fidelity Zero marketing trick. I believe Fidelity can offer this this for two reasons - 1) These funds only pay dividends semi-annually, so I think they are making money on the cash, and 2) They don't use the same indexes as Vanguard does, which may save them a little.
From what I have read, this is only true if you are having dividends paid out in cash to another account. If you are reinvesting dividends like most people do with an IRA then they are reinvested as they are received like in any other mutual fund.

In any event, with her just starting out with a Roth IRA at age 18 the differences between Vanguard and Fidelity are trivial. It's just that Vanguard wouldn't let us actually open an account so that made the decision easy. I didn't see the point in finding a different Fidelity index fund that had higher fees when they had a zero fee fund that was what we wanted anyway. She's not locked in. She can swap it for any other Fidelity fund down the road if she wants.
Agreed wouldn't worry about this. AIUI this fund is a loss leader and a bit of a mouse trap. In particular some folks put money into it in taxable forgetting this cannot be owned at any other brokerage. So when they decide to leave for whatever reason they are stuck or forced to sell and pay taxes. This is a non-issue for your daughter in a Roth.

Mostly use ETFs at Fidelity, but any spare change that doesn't fit into an ETF purchase for whatever reason goes in the zero funds.

Though if you or she decides to change it for whatever reason, there is FSKAX, which tracks the Dow Jones U.S. Total Stock Market Index and costs only 1.5bps (so still incredibly cheap).
"Anyone who claims to understand quantum theory is either lying or crazy" -- Richard Feynman
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by markjk »

tomsense76 wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 2:03 am
texasdiver wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:55 pm I don't know if anyone else experienced this. This past weekend I tried to help my young daughter open up a new Vanguard Roth IRA account. The web site was glitching and we got all the way through the new account information page, tediously entering all her information and then it crashed. Tried with Chrome and Edge so wasn't our browser. Tried again today and same result. Apparently Vanguard doesn't want her new account.

So we flipped over to Fidelity and it all went seamlessly and I discovered that Fidelity has 4 zero-fee index funds. So daughter is now the new proud owner of a new Roth IRA holding FZROK. She is 18 and will now probably be with Fidelity for the rest of her life. Vanguard's loss I guess. Little things like this can have a life-long effect.
Good job on getting her setup with Roth! :D

When I started out my Dad also helped me open a Roth. I think he was initially looking at Vanguard, but there were account minimums that would have been impractical. So he set me up with Fidelity. There was not the same selection of low cost funds, target date funds, etc. as there are today and so we went with FFNOX. Was a happy camper for a while until they tacked on some fees for accounts below some threshold. I don't recall what the threshold was and for various reasons wouldn't meet that requirement. So moved it out of there as fast as I could to a different provider. Fast-forward several years and a couple more moves (for various reasons) I'm now back at Fidelity. They have since gotten rid of the policy I didn't like. Plus the account is bigger (so less likely to run afoul of a similar constraint in the future). Right now I'm mostly happy with them (they'd did urk me with how they handled some tax forms not that long ago, but not bad enough to leave).

Morale of the story every provider can and does screw up eventually. Also just because one sets up an account at a particular provider hardly means they will stay there for life.
+1 everything you said.

I have accounts at both Fidelity and Vanguard. I like both platforms personally and will retain both for the foreseeable future. I suspect once Vanguard is complete with their multi-year internal system upgrade, a lot of the customer service issues we've heard about will subside. Changing the underlying systems of a company that manages 7 Trillion in assets is a big deal.
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ruralavalon
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by ruralavalon »

mervinj7 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 5:14 pm
GaryA505 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 2:02 pm I'm surprised so many people fall for the Fidelity Zero marketing trick. I believe Fidelity can offer this this for two reasons - 1) These funds only pay dividends semi-annually, so I think they are making money on the cash, and 2) They don't use the same indexes as Vanguard does, which may save them a little.
Reason 1 is fundamentally wrong. The dividends are not held in cash until distributed. They are invested in the fund. You can look at the monthly holdings before and after the distribution to see the percentage of cash.

You can take a look at an earlier forum discussion regarding this common misconception on how mutual funds in general "hold" dividends.

viewtopic.php?p=4827032#p4827032

You can also look how even VTSAX uses futures to offset the cash drag of their cash holdings.
viewtopic.php?p=4827458#p4827458
The second reason is correct. Fidelity uses their own unique indexes for the ZERO funds, so don't have to pay an index provider like S&P or CRSP a licensing fee to use a standard publicly available index.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by Cheez-It Guy »

smectym wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 1:25 am
bondsr4me wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 11:03 am
mrjohnanderson007 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 10:48 am So I'll stay at vanguard until I have a problem with them.
I agree with that....nobody should change brokerages unless they have had problems with that broker.

We all know Vanguard has problems (as all do) and seems to be on a slide down.
Sticking with Vanguard as well—at least in the product lines they haven’t abandoned yet—but as puzzled as most at the “slide down.” Not privy to their spreadsheets, but I doubt that introducing 24/7 customer service (CS), stepping up the training of current CS, hiring 2,000 more CS, and related infrastructure moves, would crush their business model. Yes, it would be costly: but there must be more to it than that. Their competitors treat such costs as a fact of competitive life.
But their competitors have highly-profitable legacy offerings to offset their loss-leaders. If everyone at Fidelity and Schwab invested exclusively in low-cost index funds, do you think they could really continue their current business model? Meanwhile, you see how much pushback Vanguard gets on the boards here for attempting to expand services with higher expenses like VPAS and digital advisor, even though these are actually good services for those that need them, and significantly less detrimental than conventional high-cost advisor relationship alternatives.
Last edited by Cheez-It Guy on Fri Sep 24, 2021 10:01 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by ruralavalon »

Vanguard is not the only fund firm "glitching", Fidelity website down?
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by bltn »

Whenever I read through one of these threads discussing Vanguard poor customer service or online deficiencies, I remember my reading of Jack Bogle s book “Enough”. In it he discusses the founding of Vanguard and the revolutionizing of the mutual fund industry. Prior to that, there were no index funds, and mostly front loaded stock funds with high ongoing operating expenses. Maybe one has to be a certain age to remember those times and not take the low cost index funds offered by many brokerage houses now for granted. Without Vanguard, the individual investor would be in a much worse position than they are now.

As to the question of “What has Vanguard done for me lately?”, I can only offer my personal experience. With a 30 year account at Fidelity and a 25 year account at Vanguard, which is three times as large, I have current experience with both. I ve had excellent service from my personal advisor from Vanguard, and very good service from other advisors, when I don t wait for a return call from my personal advisor. I ve had very good service from the advisors from Fidelity and I do get to go to the local office when I want personal interaction. Occasionally at my yearly meeting with my Fidelity advisor locally, I occasionally get a subtle sales pitch for a product with higher fees for additional services. I never get that from Vanguard. Their advice to me is mostly bread and butter broad based indexing, period. My fixed income funds at Vanguard have higher rates of return than the comparable funds at Fidelity due to lower expenses.

I ve done well following the Vanguard principals for wealth accumulation over the years. See, I really belong in this forum!!
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by bltn »

Cheez-It Guy wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 7:03 am
smectym wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 1:25 am
bondsr4me wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 11:03 am
mrjohnanderson007 wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 10:48 am So I'll stay at vanguard until I have a problem with them.
I agree with that....nobody should change brokerages unless they have had problems with that broker.

We all know Vanguard has problems (as all do) and seems to be on a slide down.
Sticking with Vanguard as well—at least in the product lines they haven’t abandoned yet—but as puzzled as most at the “slide down.” Not privy to their spreadsheets, but I doubt that introducing 24/7 customer service (CS), stepping up the training of current CS, hiring 2,000 more CS, and related infrastructure moves, would crush their business model. Yes, it would be costly: but there must be more to it than that. Their competitors treat such costs as a fact of competitive life.
But their competitors have highly-profitable legacy offerings to offset their loss-leaders. If everyone at Fidelity and Schwab invested exclusively in low-cost index funds, do you think they could really continue their current business model? Meanwhile, you see how much pushback Vanguard gets on the boards here for attempting to expand a services with higher expenses like VPAS and digital advisor, even though these are actually good services for those that need them, and significantly less detrimental than conventional high-cost advisor relationship alternatives.
Well put.
These facts seem pretty obvious, but are overlooked by many.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by student »

ruralavalon wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 7:36 am Vanguard is not the only fund firm "glitching", Fidelity website down?
Not too bad, OP reported it was fixed within two hours. Personally, I did not have major issues with Vanguard. The main reason that I moved away was they do not have 24 hours customer service. Getting rid of secure messaging doesn't help.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by SmileyFace »

student wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 8:05 am
ruralavalon wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 7:36 am Vanguard is not the only fund firm "glitching", Fidelity website down?
Not too bad, OP reported it was fixed within two hours. Personally, I did not have major issues with Vanguard. The main reason that I moved away was they do not have 24 hours customer service. Getting rid of secure messaging doesn't help.
People were reporting it back up in 30 minutes. And at least during this after hours outage the OP had the option of picking up the phone and calling Fidelity. You can't say the same for Vanguard.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by ruralavalon »

SmileyFace wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 8:18 am
student wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 8:05 am
ruralavalon wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 7:36 am Vanguard is not the only fund firm "glitching", Fidelity website down?
Not too bad, OP reported it was fixed within two hours. Personally, I did not have major issues with Vanguard. The main reason that I moved away was they do not have 24 hours customer service. Getting rid of secure messaging doesn't help.
People were reporting it back up in 30 minutes. And at least during this after hours outage the OP had the option of picking up the phone and calling Fidelity. You can't say the same for Vanguard.
These glitches get fixed pretty fast, are inconvenient but not a big deal it seems.

Whenever I see a post saying there is some problem with the Vanguard website or app I login to check, and there is no problem.

Perhaps there was a problem that got fixed by the time I got there, or perhaps there was no problem in first place. I don't know. This hasn't inconvenienced me one bit.

I have never had a question that couldn't have waited a couple of days if necessary. I have never had a question that didn't get answered in minutes.
"Everything should be as simple as it is, but not simpler." - Albert Einstein | Wiki article link: Bogleheads® investment philosophy
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SmileyFace
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by SmileyFace »

ruralavalon wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 8:27 am
SmileyFace wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 8:18 am
student wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 8:05 am
ruralavalon wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 7:36 am Vanguard is not the only fund firm "glitching", Fidelity website down?
Not too bad, OP reported it was fixed within two hours. Personally, I did not have major issues with Vanguard. The main reason that I moved away was they do not have 24 hours customer service. Getting rid of secure messaging doesn't help.
People were reporting it back up in 30 minutes. And at least during this after hours outage the OP had the option of picking up the phone and calling Fidelity. You can't say the same for Vanguard.
These glitches get fixed pretty fast, are inconvenient but not a big deal it seems.

Whenever I see a post saying there is some problem with the Vanguard website or app I login to check, and there is no problem.

Perhaps there was a problem that got fixed by the time got there, or perhaps there was no problem in first place. I don't know. This hasn't inconvenienced me one bit.
Someone here (can't find the post) reported seeing a $0 balance in their Vanguard accounts over an entire weekend - life savings seemingly gone. Since Vanguard support shuts the lights out for the weekend they had to wait until Monday morning business hours to call Vanguard and get the problem worked on. It's comforting to know that the holder of my lifetime savings will be around to answer my call on a weekend if there is a weekend long glitch or problem with my account.
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by mtmingus »

I have learned more than once that you actually pay to "save money".
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Re: Vanguard glitching so Fidelity has a new customer

Post by LadyGeek »

jebmke wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 8:21 am The forum is filled with VG complaint threads so you are not alone.

Perhaps they could all be consolidated into the mother of all VG complaint threads.
Sorry, but it's simply too difficult and confusing to do so.

We do consolidate threads when they are clearly focused on a single issue and it does not conflict with the OP's situation. This simply does not happen when making a "general" complaint thread. Both the readers and the moderators won't be able to separate the individual situations.

In this case, the OP is explaining about her/his young daughter's Roth IRA account.
exodusNH wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 11:07 pm Just don't hold those zero ER funds in taxable, since they're not portable to other brokerages. You'd need to liquidate, paying capital gains, to get out of those funds.
I want to make sure this point isn't missed. If the funds are in a taxable account and you want to move them out of Fidelity, you'll get hit with a capital gains tax. See: Mutual funds for Bogleheads (Mutual funds at Fidelity) and read Note 5.
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