I researched Plus500 & was shocked to find so many bad reviews, to the extent of me myself being convinced that they're a scam
I'm a strong skeptic...
But I know that there are always 2 sides to a story, so I decided to "attack" them myself...
This is a copy of an e-mail I sent them:
Hi, I have some questions...
1. May I have a list of countries not eligible for the no deposit bonus & why? Looks like discrimination...
I can't find it anywhere on your site
There are a lot of bad publicity on the web for your company just because of this
2. Does the no deposit bonus have an expiration date? If so, how long & where was it stated?
Cos I read every single word at http://www.plus500.com/Promotions/Bonus.aspx/?id=22865&pl=2 & searched your site but found nothing
But when I searched the web, someone mentioned u cancelled the bonus, saying the bonus expired after 1 month, so i'm confused...
3. Through reviews, I noticed u find lots of reasons & excuses to close people's accounts only when they want to withdraw
Thus, many people complained about your withdrawal problems
Some even claimed u refused to give them a reason for closing their accounts...
1 of them even have proof of manipulation: http://i51.tinypic.com/m73zet.jpg
Can u explain that plz?
4. Can u show me where it states no scalping?
Cos I couldn't find any scalping rules anywhere in your User Agreement
But again, some customers complained u closed their accounts due to scalping
If scalping is prohibited, how long do i need to keep a position open so it doesn't count as scalping?
I think I did scalp once or twice I'm not sure
Can u plz check & tell me if i did?
If I did, does that mean u'll void my orders, and/or issue a warning?
Or do u just wait until I issue a withdrawal, then only u close my whole account?
Legally robbing me, wasting my time & money...
Their reply:
1. Countries that are not eligible for this bonus are countries from South America and Eastern Europe.
We have nothing against South Americans nor Eastern Europeans, it is just that by experience we found that bonus abuse is common in these countries and decided to not offer the free bonus there. If this ceases to be a problem, of course we will offer bonuses in as many countries as possible as it attract customers. But currently, we found that customers from these countries usually open many accounts in trying to fulfill the bonus conditions by receiving it repeatedly. It has nothing to do with discrimination, it is similar to the fact for example that most online companies will not accept credit cards from Indonesia. Although they would have loved to get customers from such countries and increase their client base but the risk management in these countries is lacking.
2. The expiration time is 90 days. For most traders I think this is quite reasonable. The only affected would be people who got the bonus, didn't trade for over 3 months, then came back. We have to remove these bonuses eventually as it is a financial liability of the company however If a trader fulfills the bonus conditions, it doesn't expire. It only expires if a trader didn't fulfill the bonus conditions.
As for the bonus expiration not stated, we thought 3 months is a long period of time and that no customer would even realize there is an expiration time as usually one can fulfill the bonus terms in a handful of days.
3. The most common reason that we close someone's account is due to opening multiple accounts and receiving the no-deposit bonus repeatedly. In the bonus we state that it cannot be received more than once for the same machine and household, however we found that a lot of people try to receive the bonus multiple times and then when we don't approve their withdrawal, they post in forums. Another reason could be that we don't approve the withdrawal as they didn't accumulate enough Trader Points, to release a bonus, i.e. to be able to withdraw it, you need to collect a set amount of Trader Points (TPs). Each time you open a position, you collect TPs. You can view how many TPs you collected by clicking on “Funds Management” and then “Bonus Account”. When the bonus condition has been fulfilled, you can withdraw the bonus. From our experience, a lot of people receive the bonus and after opening only a couple of positions try to withdraw the bonus. we of course cannot approve this withdrawal.
As for that proof of manipulation you sent, there could be delays between both platforms, also, we sometimes receive up to 10 price updates per second per instrument - it is impossible to display all these updates and usually we update the price just once per second so you could see a small price difference between 2 platforms. We developed the software in-house, we provide a Windows version, a web version, an iPhone and iPad version, and soon an Android version. We put all this effort into customer support, marketing, etc, we have been authorized and are regulated by the FSA, the strictest regulator in the EU, and would risk all of this to manipulate prices to earn a penny? It simply makes no sense at all. But people can post whatever you like, if you search for PayPal scam you'll also get many results, it doesn't mean it's true.
4.In the User Agreement:
24.1.7 you will not enter into any Transaction for the purposes of arbitrage, scalping or to exploit any temporal and/or minor inaccuracy in any rate or price offered on the Trading Platform;
Scalping is a position that is usually left open for less than 2 minutes. We would not close someone's account for opening a few short term positions, this would be only for users who's large majority of positions fall into this category, and I do mean by a large majority. If most of your positions were for the purpose of scalping, yes, we would void these positions.I hope this helps,
Sincerely,
Brian
Customer Support Representative
Plus500.com
My bad i couldn't find the scalping rules, read through it at 3am...
But still, they should've included their limitations on scalping as different companies have different time limits
So far, they have provided reasonable explanations as to why there are so many "Plus500 scam" reviews out there
Also, if u neglect to read their User Agreement, plz don't complain Plus500 scam all over the net when they void your profits or close your account if u scalp, use ea, robots, or auto data entry etc
Don't create multiple accounts or try to cheat using proxy etc, they know how to catch these cheaters & already caught those who tried to cheat
Yes I'm their affiliate but that doesn't mean this Plus500 review is fake nor does it mean I'm safe from their scam if they really do as I'm their trader as well
I'm just trying to protect myself & others
I wanna be straightforward & inform u & myself of all their pros & cons beforehand
This Plus500 review is strictly a real e-mail interview for others to decide if they should trust this company or not
Sorry if it's too long but I want to cover as much details as possible
Anymore questions u can ask me & I'll email them directly, I also wanna make sure I'm safe
Updates: It's over a year now & Plus500 has reached over 1 million traders
If "Plus500 scam" is true, those other 1 million would start complaining & filing lawsuits & they would most probably be shut down by now
I also don't think they would dare try scamming a few people just to lose more than a million clients
Click here for more info
Bottomline: Plus500 is not scam & will probably never even try to scam because they already have more than a million traders
You wouldn't dare risk scamming a few people just to destroy your company with a million clients, would u?
New Updates: (Extras)
I wasn't happy with the 1st deposit bonus having a 3months expiration date, so I emailed Plus500 support
Their solution: Contact them to renew
This is a copy of the email:
3 months for no deposit bonus (60 TP)
3 months for max 1st deposit bonus (10,000 TP) too?
Can u remove the expiration date for depositers?
Or are u purposely just making it hard for huge depositers to unlock the bonus?
At least treat your clients who deposits better?
Especially those who wants to deposit a lot
I was thinking of getting max bonus by depositing a lot, I was even unsure if I could complete so many TP, but now it even has an expiration date...
Very discouraging, I don't think I'll be depositing...
I'm sure many people think that too, that's more reason to hold us back from depositing
Hello,
Thank you for contacting us.
The first deposit bonus does expire after 3 months but unlike the no deposit bonus it can be renewed if the client contacts us.
If you require any further assistance, feel free to contact us.
Regards
Chloe
Customer Support
Chloe
Customer Support
Plus500UK Ltd
So the 1st deposit bonus will not expire as long as you contact them
& u can also withdraw your deposit + profits anytime, without the bonus even if u haven't completed the Trader Points needed (This was answered in another email:
The bonus is added to your bonus account and you are unable to use it until you have gained enough trader points to release it.
You may withdraw any funds you have deposited and any profits you have made any time you wish to.)
In the 1st email, they mentioned that bonuses not used for a long period of time are a financial liability
So I guess that's why they can't just remove the expiration date and require us to contact them to renew it
It's not stated anywhere for now so if they don't allow you to renew, just show them this page
I can even provide email proof if needed
