(Part 1 of 2)

In May of 2007, Illinois State Treasurer State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias stated that the state's "Cash Dash" abandoned asset program is holding nearly $1.4 Billion in Illinois unclaimed money. The only thing standing between the cash and its true owners is the knowledge that it is out there waiting to be claimed and the knowledge to locate it.

Sadly in addition to Illinois, state treasury departments across the nation continue to take in more unclaimed funds each year than they give back to the people. Due to the fact that everyone believes in the old "if it's too good to be true" saying, most people do not believe that there are truly tens of billions of dollars that can be claimed nationwide. Even for those few who have come to accept the truth about unclaimed assets, the best way to locate these monies eludes them more often than not.

The Prairie is State is one of those rare states that is holding over a billion dollars on its own, and that means that if you are a resident of Illinois then you have even greater odds of tracking down a claim in your name, especially when you factor in that the state has less than 13 million people and there are over 10 million names on the state's Illinois database.

Even though there are many more, Illinois names the following as the most common sources of forgotten funds: credit balances, customer deposits or overpayments, safe deposit box contents, money orders, refunds, paid-up life insurance policies, travelers checks, unpaid wages or commissions, abandoned savings and checking accounts, bonds, stock, un-cashed dividends, mutual funds. People who have had or know someone who might have had one of these accounts at some point in the past is encouraged to search often.

The Illinois State Treasury has returned over $432 million since it took control of the unclaimed funds program in 1999, 84 million dollars of which was returned in 2006 alone, but with $1.4 Billion waiting to be claimed and more coming in all the time, the mountain of cash will continue to grow.

(to be continued)

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Giannoulias to return over $216000 to La Salle County residents – Morris Daily Herald
table border=0 width= valign=top cellpadding=2 cellspacing=7trtd valign=top class=jfont style=font-size:85%;font-family:arial,sans-serifbrdiv style=padding-top:0.8em;img alt= height=1 width=1/divdiv class=lha href=http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=Tct=us/3-0fd=Rurl=http://www.morrisdailyherald.com/articles/2009/01/30/news/219cgrucashdash.txtcid=1298978737ei=Xd6HSdTsNYTFmQfp69yICQusg=AFQjCNHMqd94BTR-yd2PEg759TOQ7spkDgGiannoulias to return over $216000 to La Salle County residents/abrfont size=-1font color=#6f6f6fMorris Daily Herald,nbsp;ILnbsp;-/font nobrJan 30, 2009/nobr/fontbrfont size=-1Those claims could ultimately result in the return of $216530 in bunclaimed money/b and property. The claims and inquiries were originated Jan. b…/b/font/div/font/td/tr/table

#39;Clean#39; elections proposal a bad idea – Dubuque Telegraph Herald
table border=0 width= valign=top cellpadding=2 cellspacing=7trtd valign=top class=jfont style=font-size:85%;font-family:arial,sans-serifbrdiv style=padding-top:0.8em;img alt= height=1 width=1/divdiv class=lha href=http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=Tct=us/9-0fd=Rurl=http://www.thonline.com/article.cfm%3Fid%3D231488cid=0ei=Xd6HSdTsNYTFmQfp69yICQusg=AFQjCNFamMKLs74RjK7O0DSQhtX4IGk_VQ#39;Clean#39; elections proposal a bad idea/abrfont size=-1font color=#6f6f6fDubuque Telegraph Herald,nbsp;IAnbsp;-/font nobrJan 31, 2009/nobr/fontbrfont size=-1Fitzgerald said bunclaimed money/b is turned over to the general fund. Iowa faces a projected revenue gap of $779 million in the next fiscal year, according to b…/b/font/div/font/td/tr/table

Unclaimed money (CBS 58 Milwaukee)
Thousands of local names on list

100 million pounds unclaimed in Wales (NewsWales)
One hundred million pounds of benefit money is currently unclaimed across Wales. One in three people have not claimed cash owed to them. A hotline has been opened in Cardiff to claim the money which is due for help with rent and coucl tax and has already received well over a thousand calls.

Unclaimed money scheme launched – The Press Association
table border=0 width= valign=top cellpadding=2 cellspacing=7trtd width=80 align=center valign=topfont style=font-size:85%;font-family:arial,sans-serifa href=http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=Tct=us/7i-0fd=Rurl=http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1130283/Lloyds-planned-massive-payrises-bank-bosses-taxpayers-17bn-bailout.htmlcid=1297892612ei=Xd6HSdTsNYTFmQfp69yICQusg=AFQjCNGzkIVr90Jx0ln6U2WtrEUVXLSwnwimg src=http://nt1.ggpht.com/news?imgefp=icgfGl29nb4Jimgurl=i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/01/28/article-1130283-0447D0390000044D-375_468x286.jpg width=80 height=49 alt= border=1brfont size=-2Daily Mail/font/a/font/tdtd valign=top class=jfont style=font-size:85%;font-family:arial,sans-serifbrdiv style=padding-top:0.8em;img alt= height=1 width=1/divdiv class=lha href=http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=Tct=us/7-0fd=Rurl=http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5goy8iFDbld3JC2Y668P7Ad_91XVQcid=1297892612ei=Xd6HSdTsNYTFmQfp69yICQusg=AFQjCNEkMqpcLPcI2eDuPoRcz5tcdSqyLgbUnclaimed money/b scheme launched/abrfont size=-1font color=#6f6f6fThe Press Associationnbsp;-/font nobrJan 27, 2009/nobr/fontbrfont size=-1The newly created Lloyds Banking Group launched a campaign to reunite customers with nearly £100 million of bunclaimed/b funds. The group, which was created b…/b/fontbrfont size=-1a href=http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=Tct=us/7-1fd=Rurl=http://www.financemarkets.co.uk/2009/01/28/lloyds-reunites-customers-with-forgotten-savings/cid=1297892612ei=Xd6HSdTsNYTFmQfp69yICQusg=AFQjCNF8I9ojnzxFx5updsTpXPWSYjiiPQLloyds reunites customers with forgotten savings/a font size=-1 color=#6f6f6fnobrFinance Markets/nobr/font/fontbrfont class=p size=-1a class=p href=http://news.google.com/news?ie=UTF-8oe=utf-8rls=org.mozilla:en-US:officialclient=firefox-atab=wnncl=1297892612hl=ennobrall 168 news articles/nobr/a/font/div/font/td/tr/table