Starting this week, I’m getting charged $56.18 every morning, regardless of whether I have any activities in my account or not.
On Aug 5, there were no activities in my account, no open positions, then I got charged $56.18 on Aug 6.
On Aug 6, I did one day trade (buy and sell), with no open positions at market close, then I got charged $56.18 again on Aug 7.
It’s the same story for Aug 8, and I don’t have any trading or open positions.
I can see the same accrued fee is still on my current balance, which indicates I’ll get charged again tomorrow. Given the equity and margin I have, the amount is definitely way more than the daily margin interest, I don’t have any open position on any day after market close, so the accrued fee is not the margin interest.
It’s been a couple of days and I’m still waiting for the response from the customer support email while Alpaca keeps deducting money from my account even if I’m literally just holding some cash in my account, and I didn’t get any explanation yet. The charged amount doesn’t even show up in the account activities, but every morning it is deducted from my remaining balance directly, with no history tracking, I had to check my account manually every day to track how much I was charged.
I’m posting here to share my experience and hope that someone can share any insights.
@yanghuay The accrued_fees amount is not a recurring fee or charge. It is a running total for the month. You are not getting charged $56.18 each day, that is simply the total up to that point. If you have no additional fees, that will remain constant (ie $56.18) and appear every day through the end of the month. At that time you will see an actual fee of $56.18 show up on your statement and the accrued_fees will go to $0 (ie the fees were posted and therefore aren’t accrued anymore).
Does that make sense?
Hi @Dan_Whitnable_Alpaca,
Thanks so much for your reply.
I took a closer look at my account dashboard and balance page, I think there is a mismatch.
From the balance page, I can see my close equity is $30367.04, while on my dashboard this morning, my portfolio is $30310.86. I did one day trade today that earned $116.71, but my dashboard shows my daily change is +$57.17.
Just comparing my equity now and yesterday, I do see a $56.18 difference, which I feel I’m charged the amount again today.
Last close on Aug 8th - $30367.04
Current - $30424.21
Earning today - $116.71
Without the $56.18, my current equity should be $30367.04 + $116.71 = $30483.75 - transaction fees, which is less than what I’m holding.
For yesterday, I didn’t have any activiy, and my dashboard shows a -0.19% (-$56.18) daily change.
At least from the dashboard’s daily change, I can see the -$56.18 everyday
Hi @Dan_Whitnable_Alpaca,
I just went a head and verified my balance, and I think you are right. I’m confused by the daily change that takes the accrued fees into consideration every day. Even the accrued_fees is once, but it appears as daily change every day, which makes me think I’m charged the amount every day.
I would expect the accrued_fees reflects on the daily change of the first day instead of every day.
Thanks again for the help! Compared to the customer support, your response really rebuilt my confidence to deposite more money into Alpaca.
@yanghuay Glad to help and glad you figured it out. It can be a bit confusing. For a long time there wasn’t a field for accrued fees. They typically aren’t much and it never made much difference. However, a lot of folks trade to the last penny. It was a shock then at the end of the month when there was a debit and the account would go negative.