Any experience on chasing dormant accounts!?

greensgr

Hi everyone!

Please excuse me if I have not posted this in the correct place, and feel free to move if necessary!

I am just wondering if anyone has had any experience with chasing dormant accounts with any banks?

4 years ago my family and I inherited some money. At the time, a current account was included within the inheritance when dealt with by the solicitors involved.

Without wanting to sound greedy, the inheritance recieved did not really match up to amounts talked about by the relative who passed away, nor did it tie in with amounts expected due to a house sale a couple of months prior to passing, and previous conversations with the relative, nor did it match up to other family member expectations.

Needless to say, the grief far outweighed the thoughts of the in balance, and of course one would far rather not loose a relative than inherit some money. But all the recent talk in the press of these 'missing dormant accounts' caused me, this far on, to look into the matter, and I have through this site sent off the form to look for any dormant accounts in my past relative's name.

After a couple of months, I received a letter back saying that an account in the name of my relative had been found, with a High Street bank, and that they would contact me in due course.

I had, prior to Christmas, heard nothing from the bank concerened (about 3 weeks since I received the letter back from this site), so I popped into my local branch just to see if I could find out anything more.

The branch was very helpful, and upon doing some searching, actually asked the question, 'how did I find out about the account', at which time I showed them a copy of the letter I had received saying that an account had been found.

I had to return to the bank with a copy of the will of my relative, and personal ID to verify who I am. I did this, and as I left it, the branch were to get in touch with me, and would also be making contact with the solicitor who was (like me) a executor.

I have not heard anything back from the branch as yet. It has only been a couple of weeks since I was in, and Christmas has been in the middle, so I do not want to seem like I am pushing them un-necessarily.

However, I have this morning had a letter from the bank, head office I think, or at least a central office or unit, saying that they have no record of an account in my relative's name.

This is obviously a somewhat different story to that I have had from my initial searching with this site, and also from the impression I got when visiting my local branch.

So, my rather long winded questions are these. Has anyone had any similar experience? Is this maybe likely to be a tactic employed by the bank to try and put me off taking it any further? What should I do next?

Thank you for your help in advance.

cattie

Why would a bank employee try to put you off taking it any further? There is no logic in that.

Perhaps your next step should be to write to the office that sent you the letter stating there is no account in the name you are searching for, enclosing a copy of the letter you had in response to filling out the form to trawl for dormant accounts & see what response that brings.

greensgr

So that they do not have to find the money to pass on to my family and I!?

Probably just me being picky!

I will follow your thoughts, and probably pop into the local branch, see if I have any more luck that way!

Cook_County

I am not sure why your relative would have wanted to pay the solicitor to be an executor - this is a common mistake in drafting wills.

In any case, the standard procedure is to contact both the Dormant Accounts Unit at the BBA & the Unclaimed Asset Register.

In our case they found dormant money we already knew about plus supposedly dormant money that we'd actually already had paid so, so overall a nice fat zero.

It took us about 3 months of correspondence to establish we were being given lousy information but given you are an executor you have a duty to the beneficiaries to follow this up, even if there is nothing.