For computer users, technical problems are a common occurrence, a part of life. Whether you are typing up an important document or placing a financial trade your computer can crash, your Internet connection may go down or you might experience a power-cut. Sometimes these things happen with no warning. When your computer is not acting the way it should, City Index, a spread betting provider, offers several suggestions.

Start by spread betting and mobile trading via you iPhone. By using the live spread betting iPhone app from City Index, you have access to all the key features of an online trading platform. The iPhone (News - Alert) and other smartphones are always connected to Wi-Fi or 3G, which will give you access to the platform and allow you to execute a trade within moments. The app is also available for Android and BlackBerry (News - Alert) users.

City Index also points to limit orders and stop losses by offering an extensive range of order types to add greater flexibility to your trading. Stop losses and limit orders are trading tools that gives you the option to automatically open, close, or amend your spread bets at predetermined prices. These tools should be used by all traders, irrespective of whether they expect something to go wrong with their computer or not, especially as one can never predict what is going to happen to the markets.

Using the telephone, you can call most spread betting providers' trading desks direct to place spread bets or orders, so City Index insists you telephone your provider directly. While this is a useful option, it is a less instant way of spread betting than mobile or iPhone trading platforms. That being said, you can never have to many contingency plans, so always
Calvin Azuri is a contributing editor for TMCnet. To read more of Calvin’s articles, please visit his columnist page.

Edited by Janice McDuffee