I originally opened a retail investment account with Merrill Lynch at a Bank of America Branch. Because of changes at another financial services company I was going to move an account I had there over to Merrill in order to consolidate my investments. What a nightmare this has been. First I called an Investment Rep who used to call me so often it became annoying. He told me he no longer did that type of work and referred me to an "associate of his". This guy never called me. I finally had to follow up with the first guy and he eventually prompted the other person to call. I then was told I had to change the titling of my account from a personal to a trust account. The person who handled this paperwork was reasonably competent but the problem was one form needed to be notarized. What a nightmare that was. I hoped to have the form notarized at a BofA branch staffed by a Merrill representative. This was virtually impossible to do. It's nearly impossible to get through BofA's extremely unfriendly automated phone system. Living people and branches staffed with notaries are non-existent. At the one branch where I was able to talk with a live person I found out that the Merrill rep is not a notary. The Investment Rep; meanwhile was unreachable and appeared disinterested. Finally I gave up. This investment account had a balance that was not inconsequential. I had also intended on eventually moving a very large 401K account over. Now, given the godawful customer service I experienced with BofA/Merrill I wouldn't dream of doing this. I decided to leave my other account where it was. The accounts at the other financial services firm are moving to LPL Financial. I'm not sure what level of service I can expect from this firm but it has got to be better than what I've received from Merrill Lynch. The bar has been set pretty low. John Klimick