When a relative sent me a link to the office of the NY State Comptroller to see if I had unclaimed funds somewhere, I was shocked to see…I do! It’s totally legit, and as easy as filling out a quick form verifying your identity and social security number, then waiting about 2 weeks for a check to process.
Yay free money!
Don’t use the shady services you see advertised on TV for unclaimed funds — turns out every state has a Comptroller office dedicated to this very service, even if their own sites look a little…dated.
Don’t worry, they’re all real.
Just visit the Unclaimed Money section at USA.gov. Then click Search by State, which brings you to the NAUPA website (National Association of Unclaimed Property Administrators).
From there, click your state, enter your name, and just follow the instructions to see if T-Mobile owes you a small deposit back from 2013, or you might even be missing an unclaimed paycheck or tax refund.
Whoa — nearly 1.4 mm CT residents have some money coming to them!
Some sites make it a little easier than other; New York is literally a few clicks and you’re done. (Just know the site only functioned for me on Safari, not Chrome.)
Also, I caught a few dead links, like Connecticut; in which case just use Google, which brings you to the Connecticut unclaimed funds site from the Office of the State Treasurer.
Important tip: Be sure to double check the legitimacy of any site that wasn’t linked directly from the .gov site, especially because you’ll be inputting your personal info.
Just a quick check to make sure the site you’re on has a .gov extension — or click back to your state site’s home page and click the Unclaimed Money/Property links directly there.
With Tax Day coming up (eep) seems like a perfect time to see if maybe you have a few unexpected dollars — or more — coming your way.
Photo: Vitaly via Unsplash
