Resolved!

I recently found a Robinhood dividend payment that hadn’t been paid into my account. It has been resolved! I’ll go over my experience.

Some background

• I owned 22 shares of Magna International (MGA) on its ex-dividend date of 5/24/2018. I have owned these since December 2017 and have not sold them, so there should be no mistake that I owned them on the ex-dividend date.
• MGA had a payment date of 6/8/2018.
• MGA is a foreign stock (to me), so I should expect a delayed payment. It is headquartered in Canada.
• This is in my Robinhood account.

Payment Date – Date Actually Received

• 6/8/2018 – Not received as of 7/13/2018 (35 days and counting)
• 3/23/2018 – 3/26/2018 (3 days)
• 12/8/2017 – 12/11/2017 (3 days)
• 9/15/2017 – 9/18/2017 (3 days)
• 6/9/2017 – 6/14/2017 (5 days)

I am a fairly patient person, so I waited a good month before making too much of a fuss. I sent Robinhood Customer Service an email after 28 days. Robinhood responded that it was a foreign dividend and that I should expect some delay. I would have liked more details, but I’m not sure if Robinhood even knew when it would eventually get paid.

“Pending dividends from foreign stocks will not appear in your app until they’ve been paid. Please keep in mind, foreign dividends take additional time to process. You’ll most likely receive your dividend payment a few business days after the official payment date.“

Time to ask again

Another week went by and I thought that was enough time to check in again. This time, I asked if Robinhood Support would please look further into it for me, along with some explanation about how it usually takes 3-5 days.

I asked on Friday, 7/13, and had a response Monday, 7/16.

“Apologies for the inconvenience. You should now see the MGA dividend on your app.”

Hooray! My dividend was already deposited as soon as I checked my account.

Overall it took one email to file a Robinhood support claim. It took one more email to have the matter escalated. I’m very happy with Robinhood’s customer service. Although, I’m still a bit mystified how this happened, especially since I have received multiple MGA payments in the past.

My lesson is to always take my own responsibility for making sure I get the correct dividend payment. I tend to enjoy tracking dividend payments, so I caught it right away. This justifies time spent tracking dividends. I also know I have easily saved hundreds of dollars (if not thousands) in trade fees by using Robinhood.

If anyone else is experiencing problems with Robinhood, I encourage using their customer service and allowing for a bit of time while things get sorted out.