If someoneās email is compromised, thereās a heck of a lot more they could lose than Freetrade access. Password reset attempts could be carried out at many common online services; your entire address book could receive an āI am on holiday in Thailand and have been involved in a terrible moped accident and also someone stole my wallet, please wire moneyā email; or nothing visible could happen while the infiltrator slowly and carefully mines your emails for information that could aid further cracking.
Even if someone managed to hack your email, how much would they actually be able to do with Freetrade anyway? The app asks for a PIN for almost everything. If they donāt know the PIN, being able to request a magic link doesnāt actually do that much for them.
I think the points raised by a few people on app development and user numbers slowing are fair. Fractional stocks being a big one with app development particularly given the segment of the market and customer base that Freetrade are positioning for. User numbers especially when there has been an aggressive (maybe too agressive) referral program.
Yeh so basically nick you are expecting every joe bloggs that signs up to have amazing email security well that doesnāt happen which is why when you want to log into online banking there are a bunch of things to do before you can authorise financial transactions. The security is not good enough simple as that. You can send a link to email and youāre in thatās it!
Iām also interested to know how many people are having issues with dividend payments as that also seems to be recurring.
What an unnecessary, sarcastic and horrible post. Just because you donāt feel the same that doesnāt mean someone shouldnāt be allowed to share criticism and ask questions. Sure most people here want Freetrade to succeed but success doesnāt come from continual positivity or refusing to recognise flaws.
Have you invested in any other crowdcube campaigns? Iām curious because of the ones Iāve invested in Freetrade is the most transparent about what is going on, and has made the most progress. Itās the one Iām most confident about.
A few people jumping on OP for voicing his concerns. Can I just say weāre all here on this forum because we believe in Freetrade presumably, some of us investing (in more ways than one) in them out of confidence. Iāve given my fair share of criticism in the past, not to moan, but so the team can reflect and build on it.
My point being that this thread, and others like it, shouldnāt be seen as anti-freetrade propaganda or whinging (even if that was the intent!). Itās feedback, critique. Itās gold dust; Great companies thrive off this material. Some great points have come from this thread already. Whatās more, and I canāt say this of many companies, I can always count on the Freetrade team to listen.
critique is a positive thing. I trust there are smart people running freetrade and the more information and insight they receive should lead to better decision making.
Nothing wrong with a little pressure from investors!
Yes Iāve done other Crowdcube. I donāt have anything bad to say about freetrade team Iām sure theyāre all great!
However, someoneās got to say it. If you use the app regularly you will see these glitches all the time. Activity feeds not updating , dividends late, orders not processing,incorrectly p/l calculation, new stocks added way too slow, latency in price display.
Nothing wrong with pointing out that if this app is going to succeed those things early on is a recipe for disaster.
Edit: important to point out that I Use the app a lot and itās put me off because of worrying that a technical glitch , hack etc is going to lose my money, and Iām an crowdfunder. Having a glitchy app is not OK when itās financial services simple as that. Any other service and I wouldnāt post this Iād just let it evolve.
Iām intrigued. How do you know what the OP invested? Why does the amount the OP invested matter to this conversation?
Like you, I have a different view from the OP but I donāt begrudge them posting their view. After all forums that become echo chambers, or start overflowing with sycophants are off-putting.
I am not sure that there is a big point on continuing having this conversation.
We all want Freetrade to succeed. It is a small company and we invested in it. We all know the risks.
I would highlight the fact that having the community and be able to share our views with the executive team is a privilege. There is no listed company that you have this level of access with the investments that we make.
Do I think that progress feels slow? Yes.
Is there a point arguing and complaining about it? No.
I would much rather prefer the team working on the glitches (of which they are 100% aware) than reading through 100 individual comments asking why is there not a finished product available after 1yr of operation.
Change it good, it happens constantly and yes it feels slow. But please, just because we have this access to the executive team, letās not abuse it and waste their time.
PS: I use Freetrade daily and have invested in both R4&5
Edit: If anything grievances should be posted in a megathread so at least they know where to look. Agree a lot with Spyrosā comment, they should not be wasting time on the individual comments. Maybe they would be further down the line if less people werenāt annoying them
Iām a happy investor, you guys are doing a great job. If youāre struggling to get engineers maybe look at an office outside London? Go and put some bright kids through Flatiron school? Go and get students at the end of their 2nd year and offer to pay off their loans, give them 50k salary and a bright future? Acquihire? Offer them a pair of socks?
To reiterate, I wouldnāt say (atleast I hope not) anyones complaining or arguing, although it might look like that; weāre just floating ideas.
Honestly, Freetrade team, we think you rock I donāt think this has been communicated fully. Iād hate for the Team to read these posts and be disheartened.
We understand you all have more riding on this than any of us and are trying your utmost to push this company to a success
So, we appreciate all the views and we donāt mind having candid conversations.
Unfortunately a few community members above are jumping to conclusions based onā¦ Iām not sure what.
The app development is going ahead as planned on the roadmap. We are focused on the features that matter for building a truly meaningful product, as opposed to a superficial app where you can take punts. It has taken some time to go as deep as we did, and as I mentioned, some exciting announcements are incoming.
Everyone: weāve built a financial services company. We just got a variation of permissions that enables us to build fractional European and UK stocks offering, a world first and a great marker of progress. We built an engineering team Google would be glad to have. We are on track to 100k users.
Announcements by other companies that theyāll provide ISA sometime next year do not mean weāve slowed down. At all.
This thread became unconstructive, and it earned a bit of a time-out. We will close it for now.
Thanks to everyone above whoāve made constructive or encouraging comments! I personally love some of those ideas @Andrewpclark.
I donāt think this has been communicated fully. Iād hate for the Team to read these posts and be disheartened.
All of these ideas have been or are being looked at.