BRANDON, Miss.–If you’ve never heard about the unclaimed property program from the state treasurer’s office, you might want to check out the website today. This week a Brandon man got a check for $213,000 from money that had been accumulating since 2003.
The website lists names of Mississippians with unclaimed property and money. For example, if you had a utility deposit that did not get paid back to you, it goes in that fund after an amount of time. It has to be paid back to you, so if the utility company can’t find you, they turn the money over the state treasurer’s office.
State Treasurer Lynn Fitch presented John Dailey of Brandon with an unclaimed property check Tuesday. Together with his attorney E. Michael Marks, they searched the treasurer’s website and discovered there was a balance of over $213,000 dollars in Dailey’s name. That money has been waiting to be claimed for over 11 years.
This is info from a news release from Fitch’s office:
One in Five Mississippians Has Unclaimed Property
Whenever businesses, utility companies, insurance companies and other entities have funds or securities that belong to Mississippians they have been unable to locate for a period of five years, state law requires that they turn those amounts over the Treasury. It then becomes the responsibility of the Unclaimed Property Division to locate the rightful owners.
“One in five Mississippians has unclaimed property in the Treasury. All you need to do is go to our website attreasurerlynnfitch.com and search,” said Treasurer Fitch. “If you find unclaimed property in your name, you can download a claim form and follow instructions to get your money returned to you.”
“We count on businesses to return those unclaimed properties so the owners can be found,” she added. “In fact, 2014 is a reporting year, so businesses should visit our website for information on whether they need to report unclaimed properties and how to file.”
Since taking office in 2012, Treasurer Fitch has returned over $30 million in unclaimed property to the taxpayers of Mississippi.
