With a lot of these new Web services like Rh, GoPuff, Yelp, etc. it can be hard to get a hold of a real person in a timely manner.
The article in the top post is missing details. Robinhood actually demanded $170k from him to settle his account. It wasn't a UI issue.
Email is part of UI / UX. Either they were programmed loosely or the email was poorly worded.
Robinhood has similar moral liability of a payday lender: it's not wholly their fault if people choose to make bad choices for themselves, but they are partially responsible for enabling them and/or obsfuscating terms.
But in this instance, we're talking about pretty standard industry processes and practices.
If you hand someone a gun with the expectation they know how to use it, and the first thing they do is blow their brains out... not sure how that's on you?
A lot of the anger with Robinhood comes down to the mistaken belief by many people that money moves instantly, trades happen instantly.
Robinhood UI is struggling to convey actual current value vs accrued unsettled value vs unrealized value.
These are non-trivial concepts. The time component of money confuses a lot of situations. Eg Most people treat retainers as revenue before it is earned; even SaaS companies treat MRR as earned before the time period elapsed and service is rendered. However this isn’t strictly correct or legal.