Tips for Recovering Unclaimed Money
With millions in unclaimed money being registered every day in the country, owners of these funds, along with the caretakers of unclaimed money, are equally at loss. These huge piles of unclaimed monies are lying somewhere in the state treasuries. Despite the federal and state agencies efforts to unite the owners of these unclaimed funds with their rightful money, the progress has been slow.
It is the responsibility of the property owners to search for their unclaimed funds on their own. With so much information available on the state and federal government websites, the search process has been simplified to a great extent. The first step is the identification or location of funds – state treasury identification. After the identification and search process has been accomplished, the actual application process starts and might involve a few trips to the government offices which are responsible for releasing the funds.
The long awaited claim process gets into the final leg once the claim application reaches the concerned authorities. This might be followed by some state inquiries regarding your authenticity and the validity of the claim. After a couple of rounds of verification, you might be on your way to the bank with the long unclaimed money which you thought never existed.
Excitement and uncertainty often take control of our judgment as we move onward in search of our lost properties. Some useful and time-tested unclaimed money search tips can be summarized as follows:
Identify the state where your money be hiding.
Locate the website or phone number of your state comptroller, controller, or financial controller’s office. The best place to start will be website of NAUPA (National Association of Unclaimed Property Administrator’s). Once you are on this central site, you can click on the state of your residence.
Usually the unclaimed search database will have name based entries, so the search process can begin by entering the last and first name and all the possible variations of the names.
If you have friends and relatives who might also be possible recipients of lost funds, you can utilize this opportunity search for their names too.
Verify the unclaimed amount with all your personal details along with the date of residence and the city of residence.
The next step will be the claim form filling. The completed form has to be sent along with a photo copy of the ID and any supporting documents to the address mentioned on the website.
The above process can be repeated for all the states where you have lived.
The state and federal agencies will be most happy to provide assistance as you work towards getting your unclaimed money back. So, don’t wait for the New Year resolution to locate and reclaim your lost funds. Iinform all your friends and family members about this exercise so that a group of people can benefit together.
