Robinhood Is Finally Improving Its Customer Service With New 24/7 Phone Support
Hit a snag with Robinhood? You're no longer limited to posting angry tweets or blasting emails into the void — you can now get on-demand help from a live human.
The massively popular free trading app announced Tuesday that it's rolling out 24/7 phone support for its 21 million-plus users.
Despite its reputation for being extremely online, Robinhood's new customer service system is pretty old school. In order to get help, people must request a call in the app. They'll receive a notification when their chance to speak to a representative is coming up, along with the number the trained agent will be calling from. It's (allegedly) as easy as that.
"You can get answers any time you need on anything from how to request shares for an upcoming IPO to questions about a recent crypto purchase," Robinhood wrote in a blog post, adding that it's the "first major crypto platform to roll out 24/7 phone support."
The announcement comes after months of mounting complaints about Robinhood's bare-bones customer service, seen by some as an intentional choice and by others as a growing pain for a company that went from generating $278 million in revenue in 2019 to bringing in $522 million in the first quarter of 2021 alone.
During the GameStop short squeeze this winter, CNBC reported that the Federal Trade Commission got over 100 Robinhood complaints in a single week. In April, The Wall Street Journal interviewed customers whose Robinhood accounts were locked for weeks, leaving them agitated and unable to access their money. And in July, Robinhood settled a wrongful death lawsuit with the parents of a trader who died by suicide after erroneously thinking he owed $730,000 and couldn't contact the firm, sending three frantic emails that were met with only automated responses.
Robinhood didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. However, the company recently told Reuters Tuesday that the average customer service wait time lately for crypto questions was 30 minutes.
"We are on a mission to make investing accessible to everyone. Expanding access means making sure we’re there for you when you need us," it said in the blog post.
Robinhood has also come under fire for gamifying investing, or making it too easy (and fun) for inexperienced traders to lose large amounts of money. To that end, it recently removed a confetti animation that celebrated when users achieved certain milestones.
The company went public in July.
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