[quote=indywanab]

Commonwealth has some of those fees you listed Indyone so the 87% is not w/o reductions. Some of the ones I’m aware of are:

The ones that CW said were an extra fee at LPL and not at CW are things like:

I got the impression that LPL charges for a lot of things CW doesn't but this is what I WAS TOLD. Not what I know for a fact but I will investigate.

Finally I was told that LPL reps waste A LOT of time with service issues such as tracking status of ACATs, fixing processing errors, and that this is all due to their support staff not being as well trained as CW and basically being stretched to thinly. Funny thing is that I have not heard one LPL rep say they face these type of issues!

I'd second what Joe said...I've never been charged for any of those things and I've done them all.  I likewise haven't faced much in the way of processing problems.  I had a few issues back when I was moving the bulk of my book, but LPL always assigned an incident number and nothing fell through the cracks once I raised the issue.

I also found tech support EXCELLENT in resolving issues, even when they weren't LPL's technology.  I've been assisted with Internet Explorer, Adobe Acrobat, etc. and never once have I been charged, even though they spent a lot of time helping my assistant with a pretty thorny program compatibility issue that took multiple calls to resolve.  Considering the issue wasn't their doing, I was impressed to say the least.

The National Sales Conference is a great idea, but due to cost, I'm not sure if they'd float it all for you or not (never hurts to ask, I guess).  If not, perhaps they'd float an overnighter for part fo the conference anyway.  You're right...you'd run into a bunch of LPL advisors, and for the most part, these folks would be $275K & up producers (due to limited reimbursement for smaller producers), so if they'll spring for it, I certainly wouldn't turn them down.

Glad to hear all these extra charges are not “acurate”. That was beginning to concern me! The other big concern I have is the stories I’m reading and hearing about regarding the service levels. I’m hearing that reps are experiencing more and more problems with things like phone hold time, CSR’s who don’t give them the correct information, home office staff not following up on things like issuing checks to clients so resps have to call the home office to make sure things were done in time and accurately. This scares the daylights out of me because this is exactly what my assistant and I have experienced at AGE over the last 4 years and honestly we’re looking to move away from that. Any comments on this area?

[quote=indywanab]Glad to hear all these extra charges are not “acurate”. That was beginning to concern me! The other big concern I have is the stories I’m reading and hearing about regarding the service levels. I’m hearing that reps are experiencing more and more problems with things like phone hold time, CSR’s who don’t give them the correct information, home office staff not following up on things like issuing checks to clients so resps have to call the home office to make sure things were done in time and accurately. This scares the daylights out of me because this is exactly what my assistant and I have experienced at AGE over the last 4 years and honestly we’re looking to move away from that. Any comments on this area?[/quote]

I have rec’d inaccurate information at the call center on only a couple of isolated occasions when they were bringing new people on board.

There was a period year before last during tax time when hold times at the service center were high, and LPL addressed it very quickly.

I’ve never had problems with checks not being cut.  Every request is assigned an incident number and is trackable.  Execution on service requests is fantastic, far better than I received at UBS.

because this is exactly what my assistant and I have experienced at AGE over the last 4 years and honestly we're looking to move away from that. Any comments on this area?

Good luck with that.  Every firm I have ever been at, including the bank where I worked for years, has crap back office support.  Get used to doing most of the follow up yourself.  At Jones the joke between my BOA and me was: if we get the same answer 2 out of 3 times from the back office....go with that.

Back office people are like the guys we get for support for our computers sitting in some crummy cubicle in Bombay at midnight their time. They don't give a rip about their jobs and really don't care so much about us either.   The best thing is to just be efficent yourself, since you can't count on anyone else.

I can fourth those comments about CW giving bad info - they may be confused w/ RJ or someone else but not LPL.  Frankly, that would be a huge turn off to me if a firm was feeding me with BS - think they got their own story straight, or will they BS you when you are there when you need their back office to help?

I know lpl, and I know NFS, the backoffice for CW because NFS was also the back office for BAC Investments. NFS made some huge mistakes while I was there. I don’t mean with just my clients, I mean making huge billing errors with all the BAC accounts. I wouldn’t touch CW because of who they clear through (NFS).

[quote=csmelnix]I can fourth those comments about CW giving bad info - they may be confused w/ RJ or someone else but not LPL.  Frankly, that would be a huge turn off to me if a firm was feeding me with BS - think they got their own story straight, or will they BS you when you are there when you need their back office to help?[/quote]

Precisely my concern!  I’ll think twice before ever giving CW the time of day after this!

Indy B-D's ranked by reps:

http://www.investmentnews.com/assets/docs/CI16801423.PDF

Have trips to CW & LPL scheduled for the coming weeks BUT I also decided to meet w/ recruiter from RJFS and was actually impressed w/ what I heard SO I guess I"m adding them to the list as well. I guess I should change the thread topic name to CW vs. LPL vs. RJFS now! My assistant and I will be flying to visit them as well.

Seems like they have are the closest to a full service firm (retail, trust, insurance, banking, cashless stock option svs., investment banking, top-rated research, strong brand name, etc...) so I can see why they would be appealing for reps coming out of the wirehouse/regional firms. I've read almost all the threads in these forums so I have some insight but I'm sure I'll learn more. Feel free to chime in if you have any thoughts/suggestions about them.

You’ve got 'em all…if you can’t find what you want there, you’re not looking very hard.  A little more pressure to produce at RJ (200K for OSJ when I looked…higher now?) and management has taken some actions to exert more control than I care to see in an indy B/D (the VA mess).  Their tech wasn’t as good and they appeared more focused on transactional business than fee-based.  Still, overall, a pretty good firm…they would have been my 2nd choice.

They DID have some pretty good mid-cap research if I recall correctly.  That was the one area I liked better.

I wouldn’t touch them with a ten foot pole after their annuity fiasco. You should have read the terms letter they sent me, telling me they think I would be a good fit. It was like I was applying for a job as opposed to me scrutinizing them to see if they would make a good back office. My visit seemed like a job interview to me. not good.

I got access to RJFS RJNet site to play around prior to our visit to FL. Seems like the site is nowhere as intuitive and easy to use as LPL's and CW's and it seems like it's VERY slow!

For those of you w/ LPL, do they have resources that can help w/ advanced planning issues (e.g. tax or estate planning related questions/casses)?

Yes.  Have them arrange for you to meet with one of the people from their Estate & Financial Planning dept. when you visit the home office.

I second that about the LPL visit.  It's a long day of just sitting and doing a lot of talking, but you can meet with whomever you want that fits your business.  Line them up and start taking notes.

I think when I went I had something like 12 different sessions in the day, ranging from bond trading to trustco to mortgates to financial planning.  Notes are key.

How about LPLs RIA platform for fee based financial planning?  Any of you use that?      

Malcolm,

Are you thinking of going indy from smith barney?

This is a great thread.  I appreciate the input from all on this board.  I just wish that FiNet would have been included in the discussion.  But apparantly those currently with AGE can not go the FiNet route just yet.

Keep up the good discussion.