SPRINGFIELD – The Illinois State Treasurer’s Office returned nearly $17.2 million in missing money during January, Illinois Treasurer Michael Frerichs announced today.
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The total includes more than $15.7 million in cash and interest and more than $1.4 million in stock value. All told, 25,434 claims were paid.
“Putting money back in the hands of people is better for our state’s economy than letting it sit in a bank,” Frerichs said. “You can check our website any time, enter your name, and find out if you or someone you know has cash or property to claim.”
What is unclaimed property? When items such as rebate checks, uncashed vendor checks, stocks, unpaid life insurance claims, the contents of safe deposit boxes and the like cannot be returned to their rightful owners by companies and banks, by law the money ends up at the State Treasurer’s Office, which tries to reunite people with their missing money. I-CASH is one of the state’s oldest consumer protection initiatives.
Last year, the Treasurer’s Office returned nearly $276 million in missing money through 314,154 claims. Treasurer Frerichs has returned more than $1.9 billion in missing money since taking office in January 2015.
Frerichs completely restructured the missing money process. The State Treasurer’s Office added electronic claims, eliminated red-tape that slowed small-money claims, and leveraged technology to allow many payments to be made without a claim even needing to be filed.
