I have been using the platform for a few months, but never tried to withdraw money. I decided to test this final step of the process this morning, added info re my back account (the same used to deposit money into Alpaca), picked a small amount (which included the 25$ fee for domestic transfer, as requested), but I got this message: “outgoing transfers are blocked for this account”, and the transfer failed.
I have no red flags on my account, everything is in order, I have the amount available under “Cash Withdrawable” in my account profile. I’ve read multiple stories of users stuck in a limbo without being able to withdraw their money; very concerning. I decided to try this morning because of those stories, and here we are, I can’t withdraw. I’ve had a great experience with the platform otherwise; this is a pity, but withdrawing is a key piece of the process and I can’t reasonably tolerate this kind of uncertainty.
What are the options? Anybody experienced the same?
@Esantarn Please send an email to support@alpaca.markets. Ensure you include your 9 digit account number. That’s the best way to handle issues especially with deposits and withdrawals. Apologies for any inconvenience.
Was this resolved?
Reading of the many issues folks had when trying to getting funds out, I am a bit concerned in starting a real live account from the paper one I am experimenting with …
@MarkD There aren’t typically issues with withdrawing funds, however there are some things which can cause problems and delays. 1) funds should be withdrawn to the same bank which funded the account 2) there is often a 6 day hold put on deposits so one cannot immediately withdraw funds deposited within that time 3) securities take 2 business days to clear. Proceeds from sales cannot be withdrawn until the funds clear.
Those are the biggest reasons why individuals have difficulties.
Support got back to me immediately, it might has been a minor fix because they asked me to try withdrawing the money again and it worked (within 15-30 minutes; support answered within minutes). Worked means I now have a pending transfer out in my account, but the money hasn’t been transferred yet since last week. As Dan was saying, maybe it’s just due to physiological time needed to clear the funds, etc…even though (1) I am using the same bank account, (2) I had enough funds available already before I requested the withdraw, etc. Seems a bit too long.
@Dan, your comment made me think of a scenario: you said “securities take 2 business days to clear. Proceeds from sales cannot be withdrawn until the funds clear”; how is this calculated? I make a fairly high number of orders per day (swing trading, not daytrading, i.e. multiple orders to buy/sell securities I then keep for at least a few days); this means I have a lot of in/out activity; what happens when I request to withdraw some funds? maybe the amount I request was not used to trade anything recently (for instance, I request to withdraw $100 while trading equity for $4,000 from a $10,000 account), but does your statement means that I will always need to “wait” for a calm moment with no trading activity for a few days to let consolidate my funds in the account before withdrawing anything? Maybe not a real problem, but I am wondering if that’s what happening in my case. Thank you
@Esantarn Very good question/observation “does your statement means that I will always need to “wait” for a calm moment with no trading activity for a few days to let consolidate my funds in the account before withdrawing anything?”
The answer is ‘sort of’. The ‘worst case’ example is if one buys and sells up to the accounts buying power each day. For example
If one 1) waits 2 business days for the $1000 proceeds to clear and 2) one doesn’t buy any more to use those funds during that time, then one can withdraw the netted $500.
The issue is to not use proceeds from sales during the 2 day settle time otherwise those proceeds won’t be available to withdraw. One doesn’t need to stop trading altogether during that time, but simply not buy up to ones total buying power during that time.
unfortunately I just checked and the withdrawal was actually canceled, I didn’t get the money in my bank account. Very disappointing, also because no specific reason is listed on the Alpaca platform, the order went out on March 1st, and the last update from March 6th says “Withdrawal Cancel”, no reason or explaination.
I contacted Support but no answer yet.
What can I do?
This is very worrisome to be honest, I am considering pulling all my money from the platform.