Have you reclaimed old bank accounts/savings/inve...

[MSE Dan]

Hi

The Reclaim Lost Assets article discusses using websites like MyLostAccount, among others, to locate dormant bank accounts, savings and investments and reclaim your cash from them.

If you've used any of these to succesfully get cash back please reply to this thread and let us know. It'd be fab if you can include:

Amount reclaimed
Provider you reclaimed it from
Website used to search for the account
How long it all took

Anything else relevant you have time to let us and other MoneySavers know will be great. If you want to discuss the process in general, please go to Reclaiming Lost Assets discussion

Cheers folks,

Dan

[tottie666]

I found my old National Saving book last week, there was £10 left in it. I had read the part of the website about claiming forgotton money so... I took the book along to he post office and they gave me a form to fill in to close the account. This then had to be send off.
2 days ago I got a letter back saying the interest was £152. I had not used the account since 1992. I was gobsmacked - so went and got the cash. Without this site I would not have bothered. Thank you.

I urge all you money savers out there - RECLAIM LOST MONEY!!!

[MSE Dan]

HI folks,

We received this in the post to MoneySaving Towers recently, so i thought I'd share the great story of success.

Have edited it a bit in places to keep it short

Dear Mr Lewis,

I thought you might like to hear of my recent windfall. My father died in 1974 and I recently found some Life Assurance policies belonging to him in a shoebox in the loft.

I sent 2 of them to the Prudential, and they were very helpful. They paid the policy values and very generously also paid an additional allowance because of the time that had elapsed since my fathers claim arose, between 1974 and 2007.

I sent the other 2 policies to Royal London, though I was a bit disappointed because all they apid was the surrender value; and these policies were taken out in 1913 and 1926

Slight shame on those last 2, but at least he received some money. Imaghine the interest since 1913 though!!

Hope this spurs anyone on who is umming and ahhing over whether to bother

Dan

[treacym]

My husband recently had a letter from the Norwich Union about a policy he and his girlfriend at the time had with the Commercial Union. They have asked for contact details (old and current) and signatures of both him and his ex, and also the policy number.

When they split up and sold the flat they had bought I think the policy paperwork must have got lost. As this was back in the early 1980's my husband doesn't even remember what happened with this policy.

As Norwich Union have asked for these details we are assuming that because of the timing, i.e. 25 years, the policy has now matured and there is some money to come, and not that the Norwich Union want to add another two people to their marketing database.

As this is a joint policy between my husband and his ex will Norwich Union split any proceeds between the two of them or will they pay with one cheque and expect that my husband and his ex to sort it out between them.

I have traced my husbands ex and sent her the letter asking for her to complete her details and send back to us so that we can send on to Norwich Union with our details.

Anybody out there had this happen to them.

Madge

[Ringo6507]

I thought I had an old post office savings account as a child that I never closed.

Traced 2 accounts 35 years later. One had £7.00 in it!!!. But the other had £1380!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don't have the book, so will still have a few hurdles to jump to get the money.

Excellent result.

[polus_]

I have a post office account from 1980 with £2 in it, wonder how much is in it now?

Edited:
Around £7.47 hmmm...

[missykh]

Hi all...

I want to say a big thank you to MSE, whilst browsing the site a few weeks ago I came across the article about reclaiming old savings accounts which prompted me to contact "My Lost Account". Nothing ventured, nothing gained I thought.

I have an account with NS&I which has been dormant since 2000 & I don't have the pass book. The procedure to reclaim my money couldnt have been simpler, one form to complete online that requested basic information. Two weeks later NS&I wrote to me confirming my application had found my account & would I send them my signature to complete the process.

Today I have received my pass book from NS&I with a healthy balance of just over five hundred pounds. 8 years interest 214.38. I couldnt urge anyone enough to reclaim their money.

Once again thanks Martin & the team at MSE for the invaluable advice you provide.

[sirmystery]

I have just found £3.34 in a TSB account that has not been used for about 20 years,
it will be given to a charity of my choice rather than being absorbed somewhere else.
Please check out your dormant accounts, it is easy, and you can decide what to do with any money in there, rather than the government making the decision.

[dunstonh]

Slight shame on those last 2, but at least he received some money. Imaghine the interest since 1913 though!!

Not a shame Dan. I think the poster has used incorrect terminology as you dont get paid a surrender value on death. Its more likely that they would have had a daily value and they pay out that value. The pru plans would almost certainly have been sum assured plus bonuses. So, in both cases, they did exactly what they were meant to do.

[enfield250]

Hello!
I don't know if you can class this as a sucess or not. I found an old bank book from The London trustee savings bank, it hadn't been touched since 1972.

There was only £2.45 in the account, but I tried the Mylostaccount site.
I got a reply form Lloyds TSB who took over the London trustee savings bank.

They could find no record of my account, even though I had given them the account number, address, branch etc. They said as a gesture of good will, if I took the book into my local branch they would pay me the balance plus interest to date.

I thought ok!

Took it into day, apparently in 36yrs the interest accrued is £4.05p.

I took the £6.50, what else could I do!

I must admit, I didn't know what to expect, but I left with the impression that, they didn't know what to do, and some manager said offer 5% per year and see if he will accept it.

After that experience I shalln't be opening account with Lloyds TSB.

[Dr. Martini]

Saw details of mylostaccount on this site - and thought about a few old Premium Bonds I used to have (about ten years ago).

I contacted NS&I (through mylostaccount), and after some time they wrote back saying they couldnt locate them. So I gave up on them.

Then a few months later NS&I sent me another letter saying that they MIGHT have located them. I had to verify my signature.
Today (quite a few months later - I'd guess it's at the very least 5 months) I recieved my certificate - and it turns out that there's £45 worth of them.

Better still having just checked the NS&I site it appears that I won £50 in the October draw - nice one!!

However - I hope someone here can help me with this - the NS&I site only checks the past 6 months. How do I know whether or not I have won anything else over the past 10 years??!!
And also the NS&I site isnt very clear on how I get hold of the £50 I won - maybe they'll send that to me soon?

Either way....thanks very much to this site for helping me to relocate them. I'm (at least) £95 better off.

[justinking]

Hello, so am i to understand that I enter old account details to my lostaccount.com and wait to hear from them? If so then I have already done this and I am still waiting to hear from these people about old accounts. About 3 of them - one my late mother's Nat West account and two lloyds bank ones. I have waited for e mails for about 4-6 weeks (possibly longer) and I have not heard anything.

Do i need to go through this process again? Im just wondering whether I am doing something wrong.

Help!

Justin

[dc110]

Took it into day, apparently in 36yrs the interest accrued is £4.05p.

I took the £6.50, what else could I do!

I must admit, I didn't know what to expect, but I left with the impression that, they didn't know what to do, and some manager said offer 5% per year and see if he will accept it.

Think it might be about right. If my calculations are correct £2.45 for 36 years at 3% would be worth £7.10

No idea of historic interest rates but seems 3% seems a reasonable estimate

[Lyndahayes]

Wow! I forgot all about an account I once had at Nationwide... I went to the lost account form and I just heard I have nearly £50 waiting for me! I totally forgot about it since I last used the account in 1992! I will go and get it next week!

I have saved literally thousands and have been helped to claim back so many things because of this website. If it hadn't been for the moneysavingexpert website and everyone here, I would have gone bankrupt years ago. Truly! Thanks everyone x x x

[Lyndahayes]

Originally Posted by justinking

Hello, so am i to understand that I enter old account details to my lostaccount.com and wait to hear from them? If so then I have already done this and I am still waiting to hear from these people about old accounts. About 3 of them - one my late mother's Nat West account and two lloyds bank ones. I have waited for e mails for about 4-6 weeks (possibly longer) and I have not heard anything.

Do i need to go through this process again? Im just wondering whether I am doing something wrong.

Help!

Justin

It took the 3 banks I contacted about 6 months to answer me. But I finally got a result today! Nice! Guess you will have to wait a long time, but if there is anything there, it will come to you. I was losing faith and forgot all about it and now all is well! x x x

[hotsnowflake]

I still have copies of the only three statements I ever received from the Midland bank when I opened a Number one account in 1989 with a £1
Six months later the statement was £1.06
and then for some reason they changed to a yearly statement and the amount was £1.10.
So although I hadn't had any other correspondence since then I knew I had a dormant account with them when I found the article about reclaiming through mylostaccount.

July 2008 completed form
October 2008 told my account had been found and I would hear in a month.
July 2009 remembered and chased it up with the BBA
August 2009 recieved a letter confirming an account was with the HSBC and to go to a branch with ID. (All they did was photocopy it)
Two weeks ago got another letter to contact them - they had lost the account and wanted the details again.

After a very frustrating, long time a cheque has finally arrived today for £1.13!!
Obviously I'm a tad disappointed after all that effort - I had opened the account in 1989 and in 20 years I had earned only 3p in interest! I was never sure from the article on MSE if you were still paid interest on a dormant account and knew it still wouldn't be much but I kinda hoped anyway!?! :confused:
Shame but I suppose every penny counts...

[malik999]

Originally Posted by justinking

Hello, so am i to understand that I enter old account details to my lostaccount.com and wait to hear from them? If so then I have already done this and I am still waiting to hear from these people about old accounts. About 3 of them - one my late mother's Nat West account and two lloyds bank ones. I have waited for e mails for about 4-6 weeks (possibly longer) and I have not heard anything.

Do i need to go through this process again? Im just wondering whether I am doing something wrong.

Help!

Justin

For anyone looking for this the domain is: mylostaccount.org.uk not lostaccount.com

[ctyrrell]

When i turned 18 last december i received a lump sum from a trust fund my grand-parents had invested into with LV - i was expecting around £3k but due to the credit crunch and the drop in the savings rate i lost over £1k, does anyone know if and how i can claim this back ?

any help would be much appreciated

[dunstonh]

When i turned 18 last december i received a lump sum from a trust fund my grand-parents had invested into with LV - i was expecting around £3k but due to the credit crunch and the drop in the savings rate i lost over £1k, does anyone know if and how i can claim this back ?

Its not savings, its investments and investments go down as well as up. December 08 was a pretty bad time to have a maturity. Indeed, things are up around 30% since then.

You can claim nothing back because nothing wrong has occured.

[cobster]

I had a success using mylostaccount to trace a Halifax account. I had tried this direct with Halifax a few years ago but with no response from them. I had two accounts so filled in an application for each account on 10 February. I had two responses from the BBA to say that the accounts had been found on 24 February. I then received a letter from the Halifax on 25 February confirming they had found one account and the steps that I needed to take to prove that it was no longer dormant. I waited for the letter about the other account to arrive but nothing came. I went into Halifax to sort out the account which hadn't been used since 11 August 1993 and had £46.79 in it. I asked them to update my book and the following transactions were put in:

1 Feb 94 Gross Interest 0.71
1 Feb 94 25% tax -0.18
10 May 94 Quarterly charge -£2.50
10 Aug 94 Quarterly charge -£2.50
10 Nov 94 Quarterly charge -2.50
19 Jun 97 Cash bonus £3.77
22 Mar 10 Book update (new total) £43.59

So no interest and £3.91 down. Is this right?? Have I missed a trick? Should I ask them for the last 17 years?

I am also going to chase through the other account that I know had some money in it but which they say they have no record of.

Any thoughts on the above would be much appreciated.