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Coinbase has a problem. As interest in Bitcoin skyrocketed with prices, the sought-after crypto exchange was the subject of ever-increasing anger from customers who didn’t have access to customer service.
A quick glance at Twitter tells the story. One of the upset users of the company’s service was screaming on the morning of January 15th. “I’ve lost a lot of money on multiple issues in the last month, and I have a number of unresolved cases, but the response is 0% ?? When will you help me, or pretend I don’t know? Is it easier to forget? It won’t be so easy after listing. Soon[SEC]I will contact (US Securities and Exchange Commission). ”
You will find many (and really many) similar complaints.
In addition for full disclosure, I also sent more than six emails to the company’s support staff this week, tweeting once every 10 days, and then asking for details of the company’s customer service operations. I couldn’t get it. (I bought one unit of Ether on the platform in 2018 and wanted to access my account, which was locked out nearly two years ago.)
It’s acknowledged that Coinbase issued a statement on Wednesday, promising to improve its service. Casper Sorenson, vice president of customer success at the company, said in a blog post that Coinbase “provides a better customer experience during times of growing interest in the crypto economy. I promise. ” According to the company, it’s about to increase team staff, increase (now surprisingly few) self-service options, expand its “help center,” first-time investors, experienced investors, and everything in between. As a one-stop shop for people, it is said that it will launch a new educational site “Coinbase Learn”.
Perhaps the most meaningful part is that Coinbase says it will start live messaging with Coinbase personnel in the coming months. Currently, Coinbase doesn’t provide any live support. Help support phone lines are only available to users who wish to freeze their accounts and are automated. (The fact that it’s slow to respond to customers may, on the flip side, be linked to Coinbase, which works closely with regulated banks, taking security issues seriously.)
In any case, the company will have to do much more for its increasingly popular users as a publicly traded company. There is no doubt that regulators will be very interested in the company’s dissatisfied customers, or they will lose existing and potential customers to their rivals. From international payment giant PayPal, which now trades record cryptocurrencies every day, to investment brokers like Robinhood, options continue to grow (another increasingly mainstream option is. , A digital asset management company like Grayscale whose trusts are open to the public in stores).
Further efforts to address this issue appear to be a very slow step. Coinbase seems to have dealt with a surge in complaints in proportion to the ups and downs of Bitcoin, but customer service has been an ongoing problem for the company, which was founded in San Francisco and is nearly nine years old.
In 2018, after a five-month FOIA process, Mashable received a 134-page complaint filed with the SEC and the California Business Supervisory Authority, and the reality that emerged was “a crypto that is opening the market to new investors.” It wasn’t the responsible party in the currency space, but rather an unprepared company that was overwhelmed by its success. ”
On the 15th, we were asked how Coinbase’s process changed, how many of our more than 1200 employees are focusing on customer support, and if we can’t share the latest number of customers. Coinbase declined to comment, now in a period of silence mandated by the SEC.
According to Crunchbase, Coinbase has received $ 547.3 million in venture support so far. Tiger Global Management, which currently raises up to $ 3.75 billion in its latest fund, is Coinbase’s most recent private round, closing in 2018 at $ 300 million (about 31.1 billion yen). Leading Series E of (yen), Coinbase’s post-money valuation was set at 8 billion dollars (about 829.3 billion yen).
In September last year, founder and CEO Brian Armstrong publicly banned employees from engaging in political activities and discussions in the workplace, and employees were uncomfortable with this policy. More than 5% of employees retired because they offered a severance pay.
Coinbase itself later revealed that about 60 employees have responded to the offer.
Coinbase’s IPO has been long-awaited by many, but a (regime) change in Washington, DC could hurt the company and other exchanges.
Brian Brooks, former Chief Legal Officer of Coinbase, was appointed as a temporary head of the Monetary Accounting Inspector’s Office (OCC) last summer, but he is working on other cryptocurrencies. In, the bank issued an interpretation and statement proclaiming that it could make payments using Stablecoin in partnership with crypto asset custodians.
It was not clear how much weight these letters and announcements had. Asked about Brooks’ latest interpretation last week, the FDIC said financial institutions could join as a node on the blockchain to store or verify payments, but in an email response. He also answered that he had no comments.
Asked last week whether Brooks’ letter suggests a change in US monetary policy, the US Treasury did not respond to TechCrunch’s request for coverage.
In any case, Brooks’s days are over. With the birth of a new administration, Brooks will resign this week and will be replaced by OCC’s long-term career Blake Paulson. The question remains how this change will change OCC’s attitude towards cryptocurrencies.
Meanwhile, the SEC is expected to be headed by Gary Gensler, a former financial regulator and recently an employee of Goldman Sachs, who taught at MIT. Has been done. Also, more than $ 1 trillion in surveillance of the $ 1 trillion cryptocurrency market, Wall Street lawyer Jay Clayton, who retired three years after taking office last month, will be strengthened. Is also expected.
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