Thursday, October 7, 2021

The Daily Money: Robinhood's new call center offers suicide support

Today, we have details on trading app Robinhood's new 24/7 telephone support, which includes suicide-prevention support. ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌  ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌  ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌  ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ 
usatoday.com

The Daily Money
 
Thursday, October 7

Good morning, Daily Money folks, it's Jayme Deerwester here again, covering for Nathan. Happy Pre-Friday!

Robinhood is rolling out around-the-clock phone support to its 22 million customers, including suicide-prevention support, the online amateur trading platform told USA TODAY.

The move comes after Robinhood this summer disclosed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing that it had settled a wrongful death suit with the family of Alex Kearns, a 20-year-old trader who killed himself after seeing a negative account balance of $730,000 on an options trade and was unable to contact anyone at the firm to clarify what happened.

A Robinhood spokeswoman declined to say whether the 24/7 call centers are part of the settlement or to improve the company's business, which has boomed with young traders investing in stocks and cryptocurrencies.

Customers may request a call on the Robinhood app, and the company will send a notification to let the person know he or she is next in line. The call centers in different regions of the country went live Tuesday.

Monday's prolonged Facebook outage may have felt like a breath of fresh air for some people, but it was agony for users who depend on it and related platforms like Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp to stay in touch with friends and relatives overseas.

"I felt paralyzed for hours, I almost booked a plane to Brazil. If it was any other Monday, the outage wouldn't have mattered, but on this day, my dad was hospitalized," Gabriel De Hora told USA TODAY. "Five hours of silence was torture."

See how the outage affected others, from a man who was counting on WhatsApp to witness the birth of his child to an Afghan woman in the U.S. trying to find out if her sister was safe amid reports of an attack by the Taliban.

💰 The Daily Money is USA TODAY's Monday-through-Friday-morning roundup of all things personal finance, business and tech. If this email was forwarded to you or if you found it online, you can subscribe for free here!

On to our ... 

💡 INSIGHT OF THE DAY: When considering which upgrades to make before putting a house on the market , sellers often focus on the kitchen and bathrooms. And while fixing up those areas does help boost asking prices, one often-overlooked item is the garage door. "A $500 new door could add $5,000 to your selling price in the right neighborhood," says Michele Harrington, First Team Real Estate's chief operating officer in California.  A garage door replacement returns 93.8% of its value, according to Zonda Media's Cost vs. Value report.

📰 And here are more stories you won't want to miss:

1. How saving $737 a month can make you a millionaire. A seven-figure net worth is in reach in the long run if you begin investing $737 a month starting at age 37.

2.  Home classrooms are the new hot home amenity. Sitting at the kitchen table might be OK for homework but spending hours in a virtual classroom requires a better setup – and it's become a must-have for home buyers.

3.  9 photos you need to keep on your phone. Why it's smart to keep digital copies of your vaccine card, driver's license, insurance cards and other important documents.

I'll wrap my last day on the Daily Money beat with another bit of advice from "Ted Lasso," this time from curmudgeonly assistant coach Roy Kent: "Don't you dare settle for fine."

— Jayme Deerwester

Alex Kearns (center in glasses) killed himself thinking he had suffered huge financial losses on the Robinhood website. His family filed a wrongful death suit against the company, which was settled. Also pictured are Alex's sister Sydney (front), father Dan and mom Dorothy.
Trading app Robinhood offers suicide prevention support
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