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Got My RBC 1% Rebate – Switch Back To Questrade?

I received notice in the mail recently that the RBC 1% rebate has been paid out in all our 4 accounts that I moved their last year to take advantage of their 1% rebate deal.  Basically the offer was that if you transferred any money from other brokerages to RBC they would pay you 1% of the value of the assets.  Of course you had to wait for the money – I didn’t receive mine until June of this year so they make sure you can’t just transfer the money, get the rebate and transfer out which makes sense.  I only wish they had paid the 1% on current asset value and not the value as of last year which was lower.  Given that the transfer involved about 2-3 hours work in total, it was well worth the effort.

Now that the rebate has been paid I can either stay with RBC (not!) or switch back to Questrade discount brokerage since I rather like them.

Did anyone else take advantage of this deal?  Are you staying with RBC or switching to another discount broker?

If you are planning to move back to Questrade then read about the Returning to Questrade deal on transfer fees.

16 replies on “Got My RBC 1% Rebate – Switch Back To Questrade?”

RBC D series and PH&N D series available through RBC. 9.95 per trade isn’t too bad either. Unless you do day trading, I think RBC would work well for you.

Another thing is that RBC paid a large bonus to let you transfer. Let RBC get their costs back before you transfer to someone else.

I’m interested in how much profit you’re getting from the switch. Will RBC charge you any fees to switch out again? Did your old brokerage charge any fees when you switched to RBC? How do these fees compare to the 1% rebate?

Henry – How RBC fares in this deal is of no concern to me. I imagine a lot of investors will keep their money there but some (like me) won’t. They have too many problems for me to stay there – the fact that I can’t get money out easily is a big one.

Michael James – I don’t want to publish the amount of my rebate but basically there are no costs other than time. All brokers charge when you transfer-out an account (typically $125) and most receiving brokers will cover this charge. Part of the RBC rebate deal was to pay for any transfer costs from your existing broker. They will charge when I transfer out but I’m hopeful that these will be covered by the receiving broker. Even if I did have to pay all the tranfer costs – the profit would have still be worthwhile.

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Henry: You must be either an RBC employee or a shareholder 😉 What was the point of the bonus if you let RBC take it all back in additional fees vs. another broker? Might as well have left his funds elsewhere!

I’d swtich back in an instant if it was going to save me money.

There’s definitely money to be made on deals like this (and the credit card arbitrage game). I’ve stopped even considering them, as the downside if something messes up doesn’t seem worth if for a little bit of cash…

I’m glad it’s worked out for you though!

I just got an email today from Questrade saying that they’ll pay your transfer-out fees (up to $150) if you switch.

I wouldn’t lose too much sleep over depriving poor RBC of a little bit of extra money. 🙂

FP,

I guess you can now write a best selling book on how to outperform the market by 1% per year 😉

I love money saving deals like that. US brokers routinely hand out $50-$150 bonuses for switching your account to them. Others even offer you $25-$50 bonuses simply to open an account with them. Crazy stuff 😉

Mike – I think two good choices for you is BMO Investorline or Scotia iTrade. BMO Investorline allows two free withdraws from the brokerage account directly and 150 dollars of free cash with 30 days of unlimited trading. Scotia iTrade has cash optimizer account and I like the idea of not using money market funds.

Sean- Nope. I hold RBC through iShares TSX Composite Index Fund. My point was that RBC Direct Investing offers some in house funds.

I would also switch back out of RBC if I were you. Bad experiences and fees at every turn have sent me running from this bank. They didn’t even notify us that for 8 years we owned 3 of their products, which meant we qualified to have our monthly account fee waived. When we pointed this out to them, they refused to retro-actively apply the savings. Just leaves a bad taste in your mouth and no desire to do further business with them. So we switched out and are now happily using President’s Choice Financial as well as Scotiabank.

When Questrade offers a platform that can be used on a MAC, I’ll switch over. Calls to their customer support team suggest this will not happen anytime soon.

I also switched to RBC and got the 1%. Now I’m looking for a deal to make it worth switching again. Scotia Bank is offering to rebate trading fees up to $500 in the first 3 months. I don’t make a lot of trades, so I haven’t decided if I’ll go that route yet. I’d like another 1% deal.

BB – the book is on the way!

Henry – I’ll be going back to Questrade, I love their $5 trades.

Craig – you need to buy a real computer. 😛

Rob – I would love another 1% deal. Given that RBC has done this rebate before a few years ago and nobody else has, your best bet might be to switch out to anyone else and hope that RBC does the deal again at some point.

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Don’t count on Questrade covering your transfer costs. I transfered all my accounts there in January and am still waiting for the fee rebate. Every couple of weeks I contact Questrade about the rebate and each time they give me another lame excuse.

Other than that, the company is not bad and my orders have been executed correctly. Good luck with your decision.

Perhaps we have to wait until the Fall, these incentives may be seasonally offered.

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