Order placements on Zerodha's Kite disrupted due to "connectivity issues"; users voice concerns

Investors using Zerodha's Kite platform experienced significant disruptions on Monday, as the brokerage app reported connectivity issues, preventing users from placing fresh orders for hours.

"Due to a connectivity issue, some of our users were intermittently facing issues with order placement on Kite. This issue is now resolved. We regret the inconvenience caused," the Mumbai-based company posted on X (formerly Twitter).

Several users took to social media to express their frustration, citing instances where the app failed to respond when they attempted to place orders. Subsequently, they discovered multiple identical erroneous orders placed without their intention.

"It's not an excuse... orders placed were neither confirmed nor we could take back the order... sold more than five times and caused losses," one user complained on X.

"The best thing I've done lately - shift 50% of my funds from Zerodha to other brokers. Looking at the scenario today, plan to reduce dependency even further," another user wrote.

This is the third major glitch on Zerodha's investment platform since November when investors were unable to access or execute orders on two separate occasions. The previous two incidents drew the ire of its investors on social media, leading to Zerodha Co-founder Nithin Kamath to issue an apology.

"In the business updates post I shared in August this year, I mentioned how we hadn’t had any large tech issues for a couple of years. Unfortunately, we have had two episodes in quick succession in the last two months, affecting between 5 and 20% of our active customers," Kamath wrote on X.

He added, "The issues on Nov 6th and Dec 4th were triggered due to edge cases with our external dependencies. This is no excuse, and I understand that, as a platform, we are responsible for all the issues you face."

In October last year, Groww, the discount broking platform operated by Nextbillion Technology, surpassed Zerodha to become India's largest brokerage in terms of active investors.