Our methodology

This page explains how the institution, licence and complaint information on ForexQ.com is collected, verified and classified.

Institution information

Institution information is compiled from the institution's official website and from the official register records of the relevant country.
Where the official website could not be reached, the archive copy used is stated with its date on the institution page.
Institutions' own statements are marked separately on the institution page as "the company's own statement".

The licences section lists only licences issued by countries' official regulators. Memberships of professional associations and dispute-resolution bodies are not counted as licences.
Each licence is checked in the regulator's official register. Visitors are shown only licences verified in the register.
Institutions without a verified licence carry a red warning on their page.
Licences held by a brand's companies in different countries are shown as separate rows on the same institution page.

Licence information is compared with the official registers every month:

Complaints are compiled from three platforms only: Trustpilot, WikiFX and Şikayetvar. For institutions with many complaints, the most recent records on these platforms are reviewed.
One person's records are counted once, even across different platforms.
Fake websites, third parties using the institution's name, fund-recovery adverts, records without content and partners' commission claims are not counted.
Each complaint is counted under a single topic. Where a complaint fits more than one topic, the most concrete topic involving direct financial loss is chosen.
Complaints are presented as the complainants' allegations, not as established facts about the institutions.
The "review period" runs from the date of the oldest counted complaint to the current month.

Institutions are divided into four groups by type, and each group has its own topics:

Banking and payments (bank, payment institution, e-money institution): Withdrawals and payments · Loans and credit cards · Account blocks and freezes · Fees and commissions · Unauthorised transactions · Customer support · Other
Forex and crypto (broker, brokerage firm, crypto exchange): Withdrawals and payments · Account and trading conditions · Bonuses and promotions · Manipulation · Account closure · Customer support · Other
Institutional liquidity providers: Withdrawals and payments · Liquidity and pricing conditions · Technical and connectivity issues · Contract and commissions · Manipulation · Customer support · Other
Investment platforms: Withdrawals and payments · Account and trading conditions · Bonuses and promotions · Platform and technical issues · Account closure · Customer support · Other

The complaint level on an institution page compares the institution only with institutions in the same group that have complaint records.
The number of complaints can also be affected by how many customers an institution has. Charts and levels are not, on their own, a judgement of an institution's reliability.

If you think any information is wrong or incomplete, you can write to us through the Contact page. Requests are reviewed together with their sources.