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| The Basics | Unclaimed billions: How much is yours?
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If you're not sure whether you're owed money, you might start by checking with the states where you or the suspect policyholder lived in the past. You can find links at the nonprofit National Association of Unclaimed Property Administrators. (Make sure you're at the right Web site; those for-profit companies I mentioned often have sound-alike names). Even if you're not owed demutualization money, you may find you're owed other kinds of cash, since all kinds of financial institutions have to turn unclaimed money over to states. (Read "Why treasures in safe deposit boxes get 'lost'" for more details.)
If you think you're owed life-insurance proceeds, rather than demutualization shares, the process may get a little more complicated. If an insurer knows someone is dead but can't find the heirs, the money will be turned over to the state. If an insurer doesn't know someone is dead -- which is often the case -- the company keeps the money until a beneficiary steps forward, if that ever happens. For more details, read "How to find lost insurance policies."
A little something back from Uncle Sam
Tax refunds. The IRS says taxpayers fail to claim about $2 billion in federal tax refunds each year. Most are owed to workers who had income taxes withheld from their paychecks but never filed the tax returns needed to claim a refund.
The good news for these folks is that there's no penalty for failing to file a return if you're owed a refund. MSN Money's Tax Center has information and links to help you file online. You also can get current and prior-year tax forms on the IRS Web site or by calling 800-TAX-FORM (800-829-3676).
This particular windfall has an expiration date, however. You can't claim a refund once three years have passed since the deadline for filing a return. So April 17, 2006, will be the last day taxpayers can claim refunds for 2002 (which should have been filed by April 15, 2003).
Undelivered refund checks are a much smaller problem. Only about $73 million in refunds couldn't be delivered, often because the taxpayer moved and left no forwarding address. Usually the issue is automatically solved within a year, when the taxpayers file their next returns and IRS matching software identifies them as being owed money.
"The vast majority have their refunds catch up to them the next time they file," said IRS spokeswoman Nancy Mathis.
Savings bonds. If ever a financial product was designed to go missing, it's the familiar U.S. savings bond. They're often purchased or received as gifts, stuck in a safe deposit box or filed in a cabinet and forgotten for decades.
At some point, though, these bonds stop earning interest, typically after 30 years. (The last of the Series E bonds that have a 40-year life will stop accruing interest this year.) At that point, it makes little sense to hang on to the bond. You should cash it in.
You can find out how much a savings bond is worth, and the date it stops accruing interest, by using the savings bond calculator at the U.S. Bureau of Public Debt's TreasuryDirect site.
The Treasury Department says you can cash savings bonds at most full-service banks, which are "paying agents" for the federal government. Call the bank branch first to find out if it cashes bonds, whether you need to make an appointment and what kind of identification you need to bring. The interest paid on a savings bond is generally taxable, and the bank will show the amount on a 1099-INT form that's also sent to the IRS.
If you can't find a bank that will cooperate, you can contact your nearest Federal Reserve Bank for help. You can find a locator here.
What if the bond itself is missing? You can fill out Form PD F 1048 to get a replacement.
The more information you can supply, the more likely the Treasury Department will be able to track down your bond. Ideally, you would have a record of the bond serial number, denomination, issue date and Social Security number used to buy the bond. If you don't have the serial number, you can write "unknown" on the form, but you should at least try to include the approximate issue date along with the complete names, addresses and Social Security numbers that appeared on the bond.
Completed forms can be mailed to the Bureau of the Public Debt, Parkersburg, WV 26106-7012.
Orphaned cash
Miscellaneous missing money. The state unclaimed property offices mentioned above become the repository of all kinds of orphaned cash. You may be owed money from forgotten bank accounts, utility deposits, insurance companies, unemployment benefits or an old employer, among others.
Fortunately, it's pretty easy in many states to track down what you owe: just go to the NAUPA site listed above and check for links to any state where you've lived. Many allow you to search right on their Web sites, using your name. Information on how to claim the money is also included on the site.
Finally, here are two other sources of windfall money that might apply:
Uncashed checks. You're digging through old files, and out falls a check written to you years before but never cashed. You can try cashing it now, but you'll probably find the issuing bank will refuse to honor checks that are more than six months old. A better course: Contact the person or company who issued the original check and ask for a replacement. You may have to send the original back to them, but keep a copy for your records. If the company's out of business or the person can't be found, you're probably out of luck.
Old stock and bond certificates. You should spend some time in your local library researching if your certificate has any value. Ask the librarian which stock research directories are available. The Robert D. Fisher Manual of Valuable & Worthless Securities and Moody's Industrial Manual are two common resources.
Or you can pay a fee to have someone do the research for you. Among the companies offering this service are Scripophily.com, R.M. Smythe and Stock Search International.
Even if your certificate is deemed worthless, it may have value as a collectible. Scripophily.com and other sites do a lively business in buying and selling certificates from long-defunct companies. Stock Search International, for example, offers a trio of certificates from the real-life railroads represented on the Monopoly game board: the Baltimore & Ohio (B&O), the Pennsylvania and the Reading (the fourth Monopoly railroad, the Short Line Railroad, is widely believed to have represented the old Short Fast Line streetcar in Atlantic City).
You now have the information you need to go find those windfalls. Happy hunting and good luck!
Liz Pulliam Weston's column appears every Monday and Thursday, exclusively on MSN Money. She also answers reader questions in the Your Money message board.
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