IG Index www.igindex.co.uk Review

Overall Rating

Looks nice, relatively easy to use, nice mix of sports and financial betting, based on java so can be used from anywhere without having to take your laptop or download software.

Prices update too slowly, Java is not my cup of tea (or coffee?), don't like the charting software.

When I opened an account with IG Index I had very high expectations. Along with City Index, these guys are probably the best known. Having traded full time for approx 6 months with a rival platform, I thought I'd check them out. This is what I think:

1) JAVA!!! Java has the supposed virtue of platform independence, so it should run on any browser on any operating system. Well, it doesn't quite do that. Having gone through the hassle of updating and verifying my JAVA install, I found that as a firefox user, there are several problems. I phoned technical support and spoke to a very polite and knowledgeable member of staff whose first question was 'are you running it on MS Explorer', I wasn't but I am now and its been much better, but not perfect, I still get the occasional lock up throughout the day which requires me to re login. So much for the promise of JAVA!

2) Charting - As a Technical Trader, I rely on Charts to provide graphical representation of a number of technical indicators, so Charting for me is exceptionally important. IG's Charts do look nice, but I needed to make a few phone calls to get them to look how I needed them to look. Again the staff were very helpful and knowledgeable but did add that because the chats were Java based they were a bit memory hungry. Fine, BUT, I like to trade with several charts and this requires me to open multiple windows which becomes so difficult to manage that I rely on my other broker for trades and just use IG for execution only.

3) Execution of Trades - Placing a trade is relatively easy and straight forward but I do have a few complaints:

i) Watching the markets all day as I do, I've noticed that compared to my other broker, the IG prices update less frequently and not surprisingly, that extra lag tends to work against me in the vast majority of cases. Were not talking much, only a half or full point, but enough to mention it.

ii) There seems to be an automatic logout feature which after a period of inactivity, logs you out of the system. As you can imagine, this is very frustrating if you need to place a trade. I have seen anything on the system that alerts you to this.

iii) You can only execute trades sequentially, that is one at a time. So until the active trade is processed you can execute another. So, say you're trading the DAX, FSTE and CAC at the same time and markets turn. You have to wait until each trade is processed before getting on to the next. A small detail perhaps? Maybe, but while you're waiting its costing you money.

iv) 2 Step Trading: If you want to trade you have to go though two steps. Firstly you have to select the item you want to trade lets say FSTE as an example. You then get presented with a buy and sell price which you can then trade against. For me I would prefer a one step process that lets you see the item you want to trade with an immediate execution buy or sell button available.

v) Other Problems. I have had several instances where I gone to execute trades and been presented with a message that says something like 'Sorry there is a problem, please close your browser and log back in'. My response contains several four letter words.

IN SUMMARY: VERY NICE PEOPLE, LET DOWN BY POOR SYSTEMS BASED ON IMMATURE AND WEAK JAVA TECHNOLOGY. WHEN YOU RUN A BUSINESS BASED HEAVILY ON INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY, YOU NEED TOTAL RELIABILITY AND ROBUSTNESS IN YOUR SYSTEMS. TRENDY WEB BASED TECHNOLOGY IS GREAT FOR WEBSITES AND YOU-TUBE ETC.. BUT NOT FOR FINANCIAL SYSTEMS.

WHOS IT FOR: THE OCCASIONAL OR NOVICE TRADER OR AS A BACKUP PROVIDER FOR THE FULL TIME TRADER.

Members' Comments onandymcdonaldx's Review

• abercorn on 23rd Nov 2008

  Hi Andy
  Very good review a lot of good gen, but is there an alterative platform that you would recommend to an inexperenced new trader?
  Regards
  CG