As the coronavirus outbreak forces an ever increasing number of employees to begin to work remotely, the systems Charles Schwab has in place are being stressed beyond what those systems were designed to handle. Although Schwab has a plan in place for dealing with a crisis of this nature, the firm said that its plan was not designed to withstand the stress on the business of having a majority of its employees working remotely. In a recent memo, Schwab described the issues arising during the coronavirus outbreak as "unpredictable," and said the firm is working to address the issues.

As of March 18, roughly 7,000 of Schwab's 20,000 employees were working remotely.  The strain felt by Schwab will likely continue to increase.  The firm announced that beginning March 19, all employees who can work remotely would be allowed to do so.  Schwab noted that not all of their employees will be able to work remotely, as some perform critical duties that must be done on site.  Among the employees that would continue to work on site were employees whose duties included network operations, cybersecurity, trading and call center employees.