What to do if trading or withdrawals are halted

Establish the facts first. Open the official notices page, the in-app announcements and the official social account yourself and read what is happening. The distinction that matters is whether this is planned maintenance, an unexpected fault, or a halt limited to certain assets or functions. Once you know the scope, you know whether to wait or to look for another route. 'How to read maintenance and incident notices' covers the reading.

Then preserve records. Screenshot your balances, your open orders, and your recent trade and transfer history in a form that shows the date and time. Do this while you still have access — waiting until the situation worsens can be too late. These become your own record for any later enquiry or process.

What you should do depends on the nature of the halt. For planned maintenance with a defined window, waiting is the answer. For a fault, follow the updates and then, once service returns, check that your balances and orders are as you expect. A situation where withdrawals alone stay suspended for a long time with no updated explanation is a different matter: alongside the official enquiry channel, consumer advice bodies and information published by the authority supervising the operator become relevant.

The most common second injury at this point is fraud. When an exchange stops, social media and chat apps fill with accounts offering to 'help you recover', to 'withdraw on your behalf' or to enrol you in a group action. These are essentially all scams, and what they want is an up-front fee, your login details, or your seed phrase. No exchange and no support team ever asks for a seed phrase or a private key. Make contact only by opening the official app or site yourself and using the channel inside it.

Finally, preparation. Halts can happen at any operator, which is exactly why it pays not to keep everything at one exchange, to move long-term holdings to a wallet you control, and to save your trade history locally on a regular basis. Once things stop, your options are limited; before they stop, there is a great deal you can do.