I had a Simple IRA with EJ for a little over a year and lost my job shortly thereafter and when I called the local broker to close my account they told me that they would have to charge me an $80 fee to close the account. I was a little put off by this, but I needed the money. When I logged on to the accountlink website I noticed that EJ took more than $80, they took $135. They're liars and not only that they're stealing money from me!

I received a bill in the mail before closing my account informing me that I had to pay $40 for my IRA by November 29 or they were going to take the money out of my IRA account. I called and asked my broker why I was being charged for my own money....I got nothing. So, needless to say upon closing my account the bloodsuckers took the GD $40 anyway! Plus an additional $95 without explanation.

It has been over a week now since I closed the account and have yet to receive the check they "apparently" sent me. I got a notice in the mail that my accountlink access was active and that I could access my account at anytime. Hmmm, so if that is true why when I did try to access accountlink the message indicated that the account in question was closed. So, if it's closed WHERE THE HELL IS MY MONEY?!?!?!?!?

On Edward Jones:
I thought that it would be a more upstanding company, because of the previous reputation. then their corporate office started calling me with unsolicited advice, even though I had an advisor I trusted. He was the primary reason I went with them in the first place. Now he has left the company after 15 years because of the change in their priorities. They have gone from a "customer first" policy to a "sell, buy and make a profit for the company" policy. When I first signed up, there were no fees for transferring your funds. I am transferring out of them to go with my original advisor (who is independent now) and find out that Edward Jones has started charging usurious fees to close your account. I will never go back.

I agree with most other raters- Edward Jones is a brokerage full of crooks. They have crappy funds (American funds) and they will charge you annual and termination fees that make bank and credit card fees look like NOTHING. I would NEVER have money with them again, and it cost me an arm and a leg to leave them. STAY AWAY

I thought there were ok until I wanted to sell and transfer to another brokerage.
Not only did I pay the up front fees of about 6% to buy funds, they charged deferred sales charges of about 4% when I sold. I will never do business with them again. Thank God I didn't have all my money with them.

STAY AWAY FROM THESE CROOKS.  These people told me I had to turn over my IRA money to them to get a job.  Then the financial advisor did exactly what I told him NOT TO DO and bought the most high priced commissioned mutual funds he could after I told him to get me a proposal for ETFs which he never did.  I kept my mouth shut because he was promising to help me get a job.  I finally got fed up with their lies and complained to E.J. only to get an incoherent letter from their corporate office saying they were not responsible for anything since the financial advisor left the firm.  The SEC and my Congressman will hear about this.  I was not even home and in fact gone for over three weeks when he made these unauthorized trades.   I even have in his own handwritting what he was supposed to do.  These people are nothing short of thieves.

Dear sir I made a with from my retire fund because my DAD has cancer I withdrew $2500.00 at 40 prsent I should have Lanny

From my personal experience,, i rate Edward Jones as slightly better than Bernie Maddoff.?? ED Jones is NOT what they pretend to be. They dont give a damn about you and will do everything they can to sell you something from their preferred funds.Check out the suit they lost for illegal practices on this.?Thats how they make money.Their "financial advisors" are a decietful bad joke and are no better than shills of the worst sort, and they are practiced with? selected and colorful but vague material to SUCK YOU IN. Unauthorized buying and?trading, failure to deposit deposits,removals of interest and dividends, buying the wrong funds? ( well they had almost the same ticker symbol!) selling the wrong funds days and months after directing an order. You are not safe at EDWARD JONES.And then when appealing to customer relations i was treated in the worst way and got less than no help. They will never do business in writing, they will not correct their mistakes and the advice they give you is? worth less than what you pay for,, NOTHING. Buy direct from funds, banks etc you dont need EJ to invest??

Excellent firm, and awesome returns for the truly serious investor for the long term, i.e. 10 to 20 years out. My rep. is honest and sincere and truly putting my interests first before his. I've been with him for ten years now and am very happy.

I have experience with two other brokerages before Jones, and have a few thoughts for you all. This is from real experience. Jones is a great company, as long as you are up for some serious kool-aid drinking. If you are getting into this business because you're interested in helping others with investment strategies, portfolio management, financial planning, or whatever you want to call it, you should take a long and hard look at your individual interests. This is a sales job through and through. I tell people I am a financial advisor, helping reduce taxes increase income and save for retirement, but I know I am at their door to sell sell sell. If you can't handle going out every single day or calling strangers repeatedly, to the point of annoyance until they either tell you to stop calling or you can manage to bring in their account, then try for another career. You're going to have some prospects sign on and appreciate the attention, but about 80-90% of your prospects will slam doors in your face, hang up on you, and say they aren't interested. Do not join this industry for people to like you because a lot more will avoid you despite the service you could potentially provide. Be attentive to their needs and don't just try to sell munis or american funds because your regional leader or field trainer says it will boost your commissions for qualifications. There is a lot of evil in this business. Jones is a great company to have behind your back and can absolutely help you achieve wealth and success, but try to keep your clients' interest first and foremost even with all the front-load and not-so-appropriate sales you will HAVE to make to get past PDP, Seg1 etc. This is what you will be doing everyday for the rest of your career at Jones. You are in a sales atmosphere, in a sales job, selling financial products to people who know little about it, for commission dollars. As much as your interests will have to stay #1 for you to advance, PUT YOUR CLIENT FIRST and do whatever is in their best interest.

BEWARE with A. L. in CALIFORNIA. I was a victim and I hope she won't have anymore. She does not care about helping anybody but herself. After she found out she can't make any money out of me, she turned into a devil and gave me and still giving me a hard time transferring my money elsewhere. Not only that, she refused to invest my money on something that i want and just left it there as cash (no interest). She can be the sweetest person when she wants something until she realizes there is nothing she could get from you. STAY AWAY

I worked for Edward Jones. The job was described as 5% financial advising and 95% selling!! They may talk about having a long term "buy and hold" philosophy, but that's only as long as the "advisor" (sales rep) has made enough commissions that month or has enough credits for a 6 star trip to exotic places around the planet (using your money).
The entire training process was one based on selling. Role playing and practicing your sales pitch to overcome "clients" (marks) objections. Use anything to make the sale.
You have to contact 25 new potential clients a day and obtain personal financial information from them while you stand at their door. Anyone who gives out that kind of information at the door in today's world is a fool. Haven't you heard of identity theft? Their approach might have worked in the 50's but not today.
Their average sales rep is making over $200,000 per year. That's a lot of bonds, mutual funds and stock commisions and tranactions. Speaking of mutual fund sales, they forgot to let their clients know that they received "special" payments from a small number of "preferred" mutual fund companies. They didn't disclose this to clients nor did they tell that these "preferred" mutual fund companies did not perform any better, and in some cases much worse, that others that you could choose. The SEC hit them up with a $75 million dollar fine for this action that is still out. The Managing Director was forced to leave his position, but not the company, after a very short time in the top chair. How's that for ethical behaviour?
Be very careful dealing with EJ and ask a lot of tough questions.

There is not anyone I would rate an inch higher than David Woodward in Windsor. Reading the reviews it looks like I have found a real gem. He's made me a fortune in a terrible market, he's professional, knowledgable and above all honest.
Throughout the past year he has told me there is two reasons why someone should change their adviser and that includes him, Trust and Poor performance.
Edward Jones want to look after this one, if he goes I'll be going with him!!!.

Awful, awful awful!!!! I have been bounced to three different advisors in the last 4 years and neither was worth anything. I have lost over 30k. The only thing E.J advisors advise is to invest in what makes THEM more money, not the client. I could have done a better job myself with my eyes closed. I only heard from the advisor when he needed to sell one of my stocks or mutual funds so he could make more money or qualify for a trip contest E.J was having. THIS IS A VERY UNETHICAL COMPANY.
The advisors are just SALES PERSONNEL! This was a very expensive lesson for me.
RUN FASTER THAN THE SPEED OF LIGHT AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY.

I went to an Edward Jones advisor right after I retired. It's been 18 months since I have retired and I lost almost 40 percent of my life savings. When I asked my advisor why I was losing so much money when she guaranteed I wouldn't .. she screamed at me that even though I told her 100 times I was retired did not mean I was retired. She said people don't get to choose when they retire. That she invested my money for when I REALLY retire 10 years from now. She told me I needed to go out and get a job and invest more money in American Funds. When I wrote the compliance department they sent me a letter back stating that she asked me if I was retired and I denied it.

Please join me and writing your congressman, tell him that more regulations be made on financial advisors.

1. For one if they are commissioned based they should not be allowed to be called advisors. They should be called what they are >>>>>>SALESMAN or woman.

2. Also it should be mandatory that the Compliance Department address is promptly shown on their website. Edward Jones makes it extremely hard to find the address, in fact, if you ask the financial advisor they will give you the wrong address.

NOT RECOMMENDED

Edward Jones is a horrible company...the Financial Advisors use their fake smile and play the "best friends" game and act as if they want to become part of the family with all of their wealthy Clients...yes, the ones with alot of money, their top clients that they know they will continue to make some good commission off of and bring money into the company...the others can all bite the dust...The Financial Advisors are what the company focuses on, if you are in any other position, you are nothing, and I mean nothing, not important and not appreciated or so it seems from what myself and my husband have noticed in the past (with the support people) before deciding to leave and go elsewhere where we are treated properly and satisfied...the poor workers that are not F.A.'s do all the work and barely make anything while the F.A.'s reap all the rewards...I felt so sorry for the lady up front...barely making ends meet, driving an old car, and couldn't afford medical benefits as one hard working lady told us while we would wait for so long to meet with the F.A., always running behind schedule and making others wait...See you have the F.A. with the big home, fancy car, weekly golf games and playing on the computer in his office claiming to be busy at times when he was in contact with other F.A.'s and betting on sports...fantasy football ring a bell al you F.A.'s out there? lol...every time I called to speak to the F.A., I had to deal with the gatekeeper or front office person and I always got the same response "Mr. L is in conference with a client or on a phone conference" may I take a message or assist you with something?... or some crap they seem to tell these people up front to say...they are lazy every day for half the day, strolling in late and these poor support people are the ones doing all the work...we have seen this at 3 different Edward Jones locations...and on one occasion, I couldn't believe I saw this poor woman cleaning the office and running personal errands too? All for a low hourly wage...it's pathetic...without these support people, the F.A.'s would not be able to make it...also, we were upset because whenever we would ask the F.A. about Stocks, the F.A. told myself and my husband, I am sorry but I am not good at picking stocks, always forcing American Funds on everyone...what kind of F.A. should be working for E.J. if they don't know how to pick stocks? It seemed like most clients got the same advice...the F.A. staying away from Stocks and focusing mainly on Mutual Funds...forcing American Funds on the Clients all the time...I guess we had such a bad experience and they do some under handed things in that firm, FINRA and SEC should check out each branch location at least 5 times a year, I am sure they are bound to catch something that they are doing that is against the rules and regulations...All I can say is RUN, AS FAST AS YOU CAN AWAY FROM EDWARD JONES"!!!

just invested my retirement with E.J. after considering many other options,
i have retired friends who have been with them for several years and have NO
complaints... no online trading for me!! i want to see the guy eyeball to eyeball,
that way if he does something stupid i can reach his throat!!

I have a GRIPE...In August 2007, 6 months after joining Edward Jones, Jonathan G(JG) took over the role as Financial Adviser for PG from a senior Financial Advisor. Taking the role of advising his “to be” fiancée on how to invest/use her minor children’s UTMA Custodian Accounts, was undoubtedly, unethical, unprofessional, and a conflict of interest. On September 19, 2007, even though he knew the laws governing UTMA/UGMA accounts (760 ILCS 20/15) and the orders contained within PG's “Judgment for Dissolution of Marriage”, JG conspired with his fiancée to extort $30,000 from the minor’s custodial accounts for their own personal use. JG and PG improperly used these extorted funds for the benefit of JG (medical, food, internet, and home/cell phone expenses used to support him and his home office) and to pay their parental obligations. If not uncovered during the deposition of PG on March 3, 2008, JG and PG would have undoubtedly continued to use the minor’s Custodial Accounts as their own personal “Piggy” bank. In order to protect the remaining funds in the minor’s Custodial Accounts, action was taken by the 16th Judicial Court of Kane County, Illinois to freeze the accounts and remove JG and PG as Advisor and Custodian of the minor’s accounts. Although JG and PG made attempts to dismiss these actions in court, in December 2008, the court upheld these orders. The minor's UTMA/UGMA accounts were transferred from Edward Jones and JG was removed as the Financial Advisor.

On 1/27/2009, A complaint against JG, containing court documents and supporting evidence, was filed with the Office of Resolution at Edward Jones. On 2/17/2009, Mrs. C, a Resolution Counsel, announced that Edward Jones had considered the matter closed. The counsel asked JG a few questions over the phone, disregarded the supporting evidence, and closed the matter quickly. In my opinion, Edward Jones' failure to act against their Financial Advisor shows an indifference to the rights of the individual investor. In this case, they neglected the rights of the two minor children in supporting JG's unethical, unprofessional, and illegal behavior. I am concerned about what type of behavior this indifference will enable in Edward Jones' ranks? Who will be its next victim?

I cannot agree more with the negative reviews of Edward Jones. I foolishly felt they would know more than I did about investing. After all, one assumes with all of the research and such at their disposal, these reps would know what they were talking about. How wrong I was. I ended up heavily invested in bank stocks, and you can imagine now what my bottom line is now like.
The woman I worked with at EJ was so nice and chatty when I first went there, telling me her job was to worry about my money, so I could go on living my life. Well, she was only concerned about my money when she was continuing to call me at work, pushing various American funds, stocks, etc. I swear this woman thought I made $200,000 a year, even though I had been upfront with her as to what I could afford to invest.
As soon as things started souring with the bank stocks, she started ignoring my calls, and then became downright nasty. She said EJ was still recommending Citigroup as recently as January, and that she couldn't understand why I was questioning a firm that size. When the crap hit the fan, she turned so hateful I couldn't believe it. She was like a viper, telling me that was the risk of investing, that she was sure I could make up the money (and of course wanted me to send more money her way to invest), and that no one had a crystal ball and how was she supposed to know any of this?
Unfortunately, this was one very expensive lesson for me to learn. I will never, ever go near an EJ office again. It's just high pressure sales, with apparently nothing to back it up.

Well...for transparency let me state that I'm a former broker. I however do not have an axe to grind. I left the company on my own volition as the standards of which I hold myself to and the business I wish to conduct were simply not possible to maintain while holding to the demands that the company were requiring.

I've read several post against and for Edward Jones. I can always tell who is an EJ broker when posting. One quick comment as to the J.D. Powers award. While working at EJ, my dad of course was my client. Well, low and behold, I recieved a J.D. Powers survey card addressed to my dad at my house. I don't think I need to explain the potential for the broker themselves to fill out that survey in a positive manner. Please note: I didn't fill the card out.

As to whether or not to invest with EJ as your brokerage....Basically it boils down to simplicity, if you want to make an investment and you really plan on holding that particular investment forever, then Jones is an appropriate vehichle for making that long term investment. But please know this, that Jones is a sale side machine. In fact, the majority of their advisors are going from the recommended list of funds which come from their corporate. EJ corp, in no uncertain terms will tell an advisor they need not waste time trying to research investments, they should be spending their time selling investments. Thats where I had a problem, we had newly trained reps with the bulk of that training on selling and little or none on knowing how that investment works or doesn't for a client. AND sometimes, the best course of action for a client is to do nothing. However, if a Jones broker does nothing, revenue is not generated. If revenue is not generated, then he/she will fall on goals. If that happens, then you can bet someone is going to be selling or buying something or they are gone. In my opinion, that is when most of the possible abuse to a persons money will occur..and does. (Jump in here if anything I've said as of yet is not true!)

So when a EJ broker calls and says we need to rebalance the portfolio, there is a real question as to whether you need to rebalance, or he/she needs commisions to meet the monthly goal. As an independent, if I call to rebalance a portfolio, there is no additional cost for doing that work so my clients know that the action I'm suggesting is for there benefit only. Furthermore, it is absolutely ridiculous to expect one or a few fund families to be able to give you the best diversification as well as provide the best money managers and performance in a particular sector or cap area.

One other thing, please don't say EJ didn't get caught up in the sub-prime mortgage mess. Do you have any idea how many of their clients got caught holding Lehman Brother bonds?..not to mention many others that are worth well under what the client bought them for....yea I know, if the company remains solvent they will get their money back when they mature....IN 30 YEARS. Cmon, lets just be honest here. That stuff was rampant. My biggest beef is EJ research, if your all that, why didn't you catch on to this and quit selling that stuff to your clients. If I still worked there I'd hammer corporate on the fact that as an EJ broker, I'm sending all this money to St. Louis, money generated from the client I have to sit across and what exactly did it buy for me and the client. These are the same folks that told you to keep the client invested. But again lets be honest, if you had taken out your clients a couple of thousand points ago, then your office isn't recieving trails on the investments...again a major conflict of interest.

If you can select the best performing funds in every case from the fund family that specializes in an area, then that hybrid portfolio is going to kick the snot out of a one to two fund family portfolio, its also going to minimize the downside. And while my clients pay an annual fee, they pay as they go, not paying it all up front. It will be a good 8-9 years before that upfront costs averages out. In good times, it will be 8-9 years before the cost of that purchase will start to show benefits. In THESE times, it's going to be much later. Nothing like telling a client that their investment lost 35%, then they add the upfront sales charge of 5.25. Yep! thats 40.25....so how many years is that upfront cost going to take to make sense?

My last and final beef is this and if I hold a grudge this is it. When I started with EJ, I opened my own office, not one client was given to me..fair enough, thats what I signed on to. Now when I left and went independent, EJ jumps on me for letting my clients know that I had left, which by law I'm allow to inform them of that. If they wanted to pursue me that would be their choice of which all of them I could contact did so. As the clients followed so did EJ lawyers, and for the sake of not having to get into a costly legal battle I agreed not to communicate with former clients. It doesn't matter as after a year, they all came anyway. But here is my beef, the rep that was installed in my office had a whopping six months in the field, and I hate to be ugly but she did not know a thing about good investing. My clients were irreparably harmed in the amount of risk she poured them into....especially retirees.

My point being, EJ didn't care as to where these clients were going to be better off, they knew I was better at managing portfolios than this individual and the client would without doubt be better off by moving with me. That wasn't even a consideration. They simply didn't care.

The bottom line, if your at a Firm, any firm, it's always going to be the firm first, the advisor second and the client last... every time.

Go independent, no one tells them what to sell, no one picks out a fund family and gives them "preferred treatment". No fund family helps to offset the expense of trips they win, in fact, there are no trips to win, the fund families dont subsidize sales meetings, etc. Hell, I won't even sit down and have a meal with a MF wholesaler. My gig is performance, they perform, or I fire them and at no additional expense to the client.

Thats the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. And it really doesn't matter because it's not like firms will ever relinquish the idea that their needs must be met first regardless of anyone else.

Good luck to all.

Edward Jones is horrible. They charge yearly fees to manage your IRA. We finally were sick of the fees and transferred to a Scottrade IRA and guess what, Edward Jones charged us $90 to do the transfer. These guys are legalized crooks as far as I am concerned.

8 pieces of advice to anyone using EJ: 1. Don't buy into a FAMILY of funds like 'American Funds', each fund is different and so are the commissions and load costs. Each mutual fund should not be related directly to it's family so don't fall for that. 2. Start small - don't give any amount of money over 25K to begin an investment. 3. Do not let them invest it all at once. 4. Do not expect them to tell you the best way to invest. They make money when you invest in securities, not CDs or safe harbor investments. 5. Make them do research for you. Stock charts, picks, etc... they should assist you in investment decisions. 6. Don't let them run the show, do not idolize them. They will walk all over you. 7. Make them dollar cost average all investments. 8. Never buy anything without consulting another advisor even if you like your EJ advisor. They have top down directives and cannot help to screw you if it's in the managements plans... it's not up to them.

My husband who is 66 and myself who is 63 (and still working)were approaced by our EJ advisor. He wanted me to move $25,000.00 to a variable annuity. Told him I would think about it. Checked with my 401K advisor and he was kind of irate. Said the EJ guy would get 10% of my $25,000.00. EJ advisor told me there would be no penalties if I deciced to withdraw the money. Also I would be guaranteed 7% return or higher (depending on the stock market). My 401K advisor said that wasn't true. The 401K advisor suggested I move my money to Vanguard or Fidelity. What is everyone's opinion? I'll probably only be working a couple more years.

It's been a while since I checked this site. Boy, does lonsain know how to spew! I have found in human behavior when you have hit a nerve with someone who cannot back up what they say with facts; they begin the personal attacks. To truthinitall: I respect your question very much. You are asking an honest and probing question. Since I don't know the details about the Edward Jones fee based platform, I cannot say for sure about what you are asking. That said, I will tell you that as a CFP (and I hope that if you are in our industry, that you are working toward your CFP) you still have to deal with an business culture that was built on commission, transaction based revenues. Another item to consider is how do they earn their fee? What value do they provide to a client for their fee? If the fee-based platform is like a managed account, they just turn that over to the money manager and are in effect a middle man. What kind of value to they provide to earn that extra fee layer that is over the managed account? Personally, I would not feel that I was getting what I paid for if the advisor I worked with didn't really manage the account. Also, do you know what is or is not allowed in the EJ fee-based platform. In one of my investment magazines, they interviewed Jim Waddle (I think that is his name) and he said their fee based platform would not include alternative investments. Anyone in this market who is not using alternative investments is exposing their portfolio to absolute market risk (for equities) and credit/default risk in bonds. By using alternative investments such as commodites, long/short, covered calls, absolute returns, bear market ETF's, along with a good non-traded REIT would have certainly seen less volatility out of this market. The Yale endowment uses about 20% alternative investments. I personally like using a Core/Satellite strategy with mutual funds and ETF's In the market place today sometimes the buy and hold philosophy is a buy and hope philosophy. An actively managed portfolio using all the weapons at your disposal is much better than hoping everything will come back. Hope this helps.

I've been with Edward Jones for 10 years. My broker is excellent! I buy and hold like their philosophical position says. I also hold a portfolio of mutual funds with Vanguard. Both are good, but my Jones broker, Jay Klawon, is reliable and honest and his advise is reasonable. Edward Jones tax information has been excellent; much superior to Vanguard.

For all of you out there who were unhappy with your experience with Edward Jones it is as a direct result of the financial advisor that you worked with and not the company as a whole. My financial advisor with EJ is more or less a part of my family now. Edward Jones is for the serious long term investor not for the self proclaimed day trader. No one can time the market no matter much they may try. If you are looking for a firm with strong fundamentals and also a firm who isn't overridden with write downs from investing in risky subprime mortgage loans then EJ is for you, but if you like reading the front page of Yahoo and seeing the brokerage firm that holds your life savings go bankrupt then be my guest. Not me I'll stay where I know I'm being taken care of. Oh and as for that pesky class action law suit. Edward Jones settled and admitted they made a mistake, that's a lot more than I can say for some of the other brokerages out there.

LindaK--Low performing? High load funds? Have you heard of American Funds? Franklin Templeton? Do you have an education in investments? Did you know you can choose from A, B, or C shares? Do you know which of the two introduced the first international mutual fund EVER? Do you even know what share classes are? As for lawsuits--are you kidding me? Do you have the remotest clue about Edward Jones? The average holding period of a mutual fund is 12-13 years versus the industry average of 2-3 years. Geez, I didn't know advising clients like me to hold on to quality, diversified investments was a bad idea??? As for Texas Advisor...who, but a self-conscious, low self-esteem, Edward Jones FAILURE, has to print how big their book of business is (or isn't--75mil, is nothing to write home about, I'm sure you drive a REALLY big truck too :) Check out his other work on EPINION.COM, he's REALLY got an axe to grind (poor bitter people stupidly trying to prove their point) People, get a clue, all firms are generally the SAME and it totally depends on the individual you work with. Some have more experience than others, others are newer in their career. For Mr. Texas know-it-all and Fee-based planner...have you worked out the cost on 30 years plus of owner ship of an A share without annual fees versus your fee schedule...please, don't bore me and mislead readers...you do fee-based to be paid more and more and more on the same darn investment plan that you rarely change--that's just wonderful for your clients. Stop hiding behind CFP! CFP! and be honest for once. And by the way...when DID you fail out of Edward Jones?

just look at this - edward jones fined millions and millions for fraud
http://brokercheck.finra.org/Support/ReportViewer.a spx?FirmCRD=250

Texasplanner: do your thoughts on Edward Jones remain the same in the case of a CFP working for Edward Jones, and now that they are offering a fee-based platform?

After the class action suit of 2004, I'm not sure how Edward Jones is still in business. For years they pushed their brokers to sell low-performing, high-load funds in return for incentives and promotions. They FINALLY got caught in this kickback scheme. Why do people still trust this company??

It sounds like the "former EJ rep got canned because he couldn't hack it :). Edward Jones is ranked #1 by JD Powers for full service brokers I believe 3 or so years in a row. They are consistently ranked #1 for client satisfaction. So I ask myself is this just a broker that could not meet his numbers or was to lazy to build his book of business? Hmm...

Loads are complete rips offs. What are you talking about? They do not go to the fund manager - that is totally wrong.

Let's say the Edward Jones saleperson sells you American Growth Fund of America Class A shares. You would have paid a 5.75% upfront load plus 0.25% ongoing 12b-1 fee.

However, if you worked with a bona-fide Registered Investment Advisor that only charges a fee you could buy the same fund wihout paying the load and you might pay the fee-only Advisor a small hourly rate or perhaps 0.60% per year. All your investment dollar would have gone to work for you right at the begining rather than being "stolen" by a salesperson.

All and all - WAY WAY WAY less expensive the the rip off artists at Edward Jones.

I am a new FA in training with Edward Jones and really appreciate all the honest opinions I see here. I joined so that I could build good personal relationships with my clients and be accountable to their needs. They can visit me when they have problems, and if there is anything I don't know, there are a lot of professionals backing me up. It is true that my colleagues come from a variety of backgrounds, but I have been impressed with the majority that I've met so far. I'm finding that our firm is not for every investor, but those who are serious about investing to meet their long term goals. Market timers and active traders might do better going to a discount broker, although we don't mind the additional commissions, if you do insist. While I recruited, my regular friends generally had good things to say about their experiences with Jones. I think the worst I heard was that their local rep was a bit too eager to work with them. (I wish I could say that about my Sprint service reps.) Most of what I've read in the blogs has to do with expectations. Apparently, some advisors did not effectively communicate things like fees and commissions, and this showed up in their frustration with that rep. I hope never to be one of those reps! You'll always get it straight from me, though it's not always good news, and I hope I can say the same for most of my new colleagues. If, one day, you see an Edward Jones rep on your doorstep one day, treat him nicely and make your own decision. That person could be me, and you will not regret our conversation.

Edward Jones has been a great broker for me. I enjoy the customer service and the time they spend with me face to face. The Financial Advisor has given me great advice and I have had great returns. I appreciate the time he has put into my account. He is worth every commission that I have paid him.

I wouldn't recommend Edward Jones unless you very highly value face to face or phone contact to conduct business. The mutual funds they are selling have nasty loads (commissions paid when you buy shares) and their annual fees are high as well. I had a "self directed" Roth IRA at Edward Jones and it was not possible to make contributions to it online. In this day and age, this seems ridiculous for a what the fine print disclosures call a "self directed" account. If you're planning on putting some money into mutual funds, do yourself a favor and lower the cost of investing by opening an account at a firm like Vanguard, T. Rowe Price, or Fidelity instead. If you make the same mistake I did and go with Edward Jones, be aware that when you want to get out they'll charge you an annual fee ($40 in my case) that is not pro-rated, and they will not disburse funds and terminate the account without first charging you another $50 fee. By the end of my short stay with them I was almost happy to pay the $90 in fees to just get away from them.

I have no problem with the Edward Jones site but Jim O'Brien in Norfolk, Virginia is an incompetent broker. I would suggest that you go somewhere else with you money. His customer service is atrocious. He definitely does not care about you or your concerns if you are not a big fish.

Great Company, Great Broker, consistant performance and advice. I don't know what more you'd want. I like meeting and knowing my broker, someone who knows me, my family, and my goals and makes recomendations accordingly. I don't want to take investment advice from a faceless voice at some call center. If I want to make a trade based on a "hot" stock tip, I have e-trade, but for meat and potatoes investing, I use EJ and have been very happy.

I wouldn't do business with them again. This was a few years back. The little office around the corner went thru multiple brokers. They were always trying to sell me something. I put a little money in to play with. Wouldn't you know it...recommended WorldCom. No problem, I thought it was a good stock...but the broker kept having me buy more each time the stock went down. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but when everyone else is abandoning ship, Edward Jones kept on promoting. Sorry, no thanks.

RIPOFF! My experience has been terrible. Edward Jones brokers are usually not even CFPs (certified financial planners), and generally only have SALES training. Their primary duty is to SELL funds that are usually mediocre investments. Do NOT transfer ANY of your funds, accounts, or write a single check to an Edward Jones broker until you have IN WRITING exactly how much you'll pay to invest in ANYTHING they offer. This is because you'll be paying LOADS (ie, commissions) to the broker "advisor". Go with Vanguard or Fidelity. Go to suzeorman.com to read info re load funds. (disclaimer: I don't work for Suze Orman, Fidelity, or Vanguard.)

Great service! Great picks!