Bank of MontrealFernando Morales/The Globe and Mail
Bank of Montreal reported Thursday that it has solved the technical problems on bogged down its BMO InvestorLine online brokerage service for two days this week.
"At this point, we are operating normally," said BMO spokesman Ralph Marranca. "But we'll continue to monitor it."
The problems, which began Tuesday and continued through Wednesday, were largely characterized by considerable slowdowns in the functions of the online trading platform. Some customers reported that it was difficult to impossible to log into the trading system and conduct trades.
Because of the problems with the online system, many clients turned to InvestorLine's by-phone service - which got overloaded with callers as a result, resulting in lengthy waiting times for phone customers as well.
While it's difficult to quantify how many clients were unable to make timely trades during InvestorLine's service slowdown, Mr. Marranca said that even at the height of the problems, successful online log-ins were down a modest 10 per cent from normal levels.
As a "gesture of goodwill" to inconvenienced clients, he said, BMO InvestorLine is offering all clients two free equity trades in the month of June.
Cat:e528746c-3414-401a-b14b-50247e3bdf01Forum:d0fa4e14-88d2-41f9-8a19-896bdff9544b
David Parkinson