Locate Unclaimed Assets | Missing Money | Unclaimed Property
If you’ve ever overpaid for something, closed an account and never received interest payment, were due a dividend but moved and the forwarding address expired and so on, you may have missing money or unclaimed assets somewhere.
Here is a short list of helpful links where you can search for or locate your unclaimed assets if any exist. There are services that will do a more comprehensive search but if you have time or enjoy the hunt this might be for you.
#1. The Government May Owe You Money
This web site offers a list of links where you can check unclaimed property, credit unions, mortgage refunds, and more. I’ve listed a few of the links on the site below as well as a few others, however, if you start here it covers most if not all Unclaimed Government Fund web sites.
#2. National Association of State Treasures
Select your state then look for unclaimed assets link in state controllersweb site. If you can’t locate it, the easiest thing to do is use the search box typically located on the controller web site and search for “unclaimed”. You will typically get a list of documents, links or articles having to do with unclaimed assets. Click on the first few links to see if the unclaimed assets link is available. The Arizona link will take you to the Arizona Unclaimed Assets page. The California link will take you to California Unclaimed Assets page.
#3. U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Missing Income Tax Refund Claim
If you’re expecting a Tax refund from the IRS and it’s has been more than 28 days since your check was mailed (if you didn’t file electronically), you can file an online claim for a replacement check.
#4. FDIC Unclaimed Funds
If a financial institution is closed, by a regulatory agency, the FDIC is appointed as Receiver and is responsible for the payment of insured deposits and the liquidation of the remaining assets. If you did not claim your funds previously you now have another opportunity to do so.
#5. National Credit Union Administration Unclaimed Funds (NCUA)
When a credit union with federal insurance is liquidated, NCUA is responsible for paying the share accounts to the members. Unfortunately, some checks are never cashed or a credit union members address information was incomplete, missing or outdated.
#6. Unclaimed Saving Bonds – Treasury Hunt
Do you have savings bonds that have matured and stopped earning interest? If so, it’s time to cash them in, or reinvest them, and have your money start working for you again.
It’s important to check your savings bonds periodically to determine if they’re still earning interest, and if they’re not, they should be redeemed. Billions of dollars in savings bonds have stopped earning interest, but haven’t been cashed. This database is updated monthly.
#7. U.S. Veteran Affairs Unclaimed Insurance Funds
Unclaimed insurance funds are owed to certain current and former policyholders or their beneficiaries. This money represents death awards, dividend checks and premium refunds that were mailed to policyholders. These payments were returned to VA by the Post Office because they could not be delivered. VA holds this money until they can locate the policyholder.
#8. Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation Unclaimed Pensions
(PBGC)
When a company’s pension plan is transferred to PBGC, the company is sometimes unable to locate people that participated in a specific plan and therefor unable to give them any benefits they may be owed. PBGC looks for them through the “Missing Participants” service.
Please note that the person should have participated in a “defined benefit” pension plan in a privately owned company that terminated and then transferred the plan to PBGC.
#9. National Association of Unclaimed Property Administrator (NAUPA)
The NAUPA is a non-profit organization. They are affiliated with the Council of State Governments and the National Association of State Treasurers. Members represent all states, the District of Columbia, and other international governmental entities. NAUPA provides a forum for protecting and returning property to rightful owners.
#10. Missing Money
Missing Money is operated by ACS Unclaimed Property Clearinghouse a Xerox company and is a national database. It was established in November 1999 by the National Association of Unclaimed Property Administrators (NAUPA). MissingMoney.com enables owners to perform comprehensive searches for lost assets required by law to be turned over to the states and provinces.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Noah Wieder is CEO of SearchBug, Inc. and the founder of Best People Search. SearchBug.com offers a Free People Finder and Company Search as well as Data Scrubbing Services. Bestpeoplesearch.com is a private investigator portal and Information Retrieval Services web site where investigators offer searches to businesses and individuals with specific search needs. |