How to buy and sell shares

You can buy and sell shares from within your portfolio, or by clicking the buy and sell buttons which are found across our research pages. Or, you can simply select ‘Buy and sell’ within the ‘My account’ menu. The first step is to enter the name, ticker or sedol of the investment you want to deal in.

Once the investment you want to deal in is shown, click on ‘deal’ to the left. You can also click on the graph symbol to visit our research pages. You will then be asked to enter the details of your deal. You are only able to deal in shares when the market is open. This is between 8.30 and 4.30 Monday to Friday for UK shares and is shown by the market status. You need to select which of your accounts you want to place the deal from. Then you need to choose if you are buying or selling. Let’s start with buying.

Select your order type, which can be ‘at best’ ‘limit’ or a ‘stop loss’. We are going to choose ‘at best’. You can find out more about limit and stop loss orders in our FAQs.

You can choose to either invest an amount of money or buy a quantity of shares.

If you choose to invest an amount of money you will need to choose whether to include or exclude the dealing charges within this amount. Once you have entered all the details you then click ‘get quote’. You will receive a quote for your deal which is valid for up to 15 seconds. The timer on the screen shows how much time is left. This screen will also show the details of your order, which you should check carefully as once your order has been accepted it cannot be cancelled. Please be aware that on occasion, for example when markets are volatile, your quote may be withdrawn, and you will need to get another quote.

If you don’t accept the quote in time it will expire. You can then choose requote or cancel the order altogether. If you select ‘accept quote’, your order will be dealt and you will receive confirmation of your deal on the screen. This includes a confirmation of the price you dealt at, the dealing charge, stamp duty and the total cost of your deal.

Go through and highlight each line as it is explained If you navigate to your portfolio you will now see your new investment.

If you wish to sell shares, you can select either sell or sell all in the buy/sell screen.

You can enter either an amount of money to raise or a quantity of shares to sell.

Once you have entered all the details, click ‘get quote’. This will show you a quote valid for up to 15 seconds, which you can accept or, if it expires, you can click requote or cancel the order altogether. When you click on accept quote your order will be dealt and you will see on-screen confirmation of the deal. Alternatively, you can select sell all in the order screen, which will sell all of your current holding of an investment. You will see your current holding at the bottom of the screen. You should then go through the same process of accepting the quote or requoting to place your order.

Once your order has been dealt, it will show in your portfolio, and you will receive a secure message when your contract note is available. Your contract note can also be found in the ‘Transaction history’ or ‘Documents’ sections of your account. The contract note shows the details of your investment, including the quantity, price and dealing charges. It will show you the date dealt. Settlement will normally be two working days later. You can download the contract note if you wish. On some occasions, it may not be possible to get a quote online. In this case, please call our dealing services team on 0345 373 3479 who will be able to help you with your order.