How to Recover Money You Didn’t Know You Were Owed
When looking for ways to increase their cash reserves, most people focus on earning more money while ignoring money they already technically own. If you love saving money, there are many ways to recover funds that don’t require working extra hours or sacrificing the things you love.
Think about whether you’re legally entitled to compensation
Legal compensation might be the furthest thing from your mind, but it’s a common source of lost money. Most people don’t automatically file a lawsuit when they’ve been harmed, but there’s no reason to follow the crowd. Wage and hour violations, unsafe working conditions, consumer fraud, medical negligence, and even birth injuries can create long-term financial damage that people absorb even when they have a valid legal claim.
Financially organized people don’t assume financial losses are just bad luck. They pursue legal action when someone else’s negligence or misconduct caused them harm. For example, birth injuries are a clear example of a situation that many people underestimate. Some parents assume a difficult delivery was unavoidable when, in reality, it was caused by medical negligence. For example, cerebral palsy is a common motor disability frequently caused by medical mistakes. Birth injuries don’t just make life difficult for a child – they create the need for lifelong, expensive medical care like therapy, mobility equipment, special education, home modifications, and difficulty earning an income.
Families often avoid filing a lawsuit after a birth injury because they’re already emotionally overwhelmed and assume a lawsuit will just add more stress to their lives. However, pursuing compensation for a birth injury is exactly what will help alleviate that stress.
If you’ve been harmed by someone else’s negligence, it’s worth consulting an attorney to discuss your case. If you are entitled to compensation, it may take a while to see the money, but it will be worth the wait.
Search for unclaimed money
A huge source of forgotten money comes from unclaimed money. Banks (including online payment platforms), employers, insurance companies, brokerages, and utility providers are legally required to transfer abandoned funds to the state after a certain period of inactivity. For example, if you signed up for a Venmo account and then stopped using it for a few years, your balance will be considered abandoned and sent to the state.
To find out if you have any unclaimed money, search the databases for every state where you’ve lived, worked, rented property, or opened a financial account. There’s a good chance you might have some unclaimed refunds, credits, and even payroll funds that you never picked up from past jobs.
Review your old tax filings
If you filed tax returns but didn’t take advantage of your credits and deductions, you might be owed a refund. Sometimes people file their taxes in a rush and realize later what they missed. If you know you skipped some important deductions, it’s not too late to make those changes.
Check your retirement accounts from former jobs
Many people leave retirement accounts behind when they change jobs. You might have a 401(k) account with money in it that you’ve stopped monitoring, or maybe you signed up for contributions and forgot. Search this official database for forgotten savings and retirement accounts to find out. Employers frequently merge plans and change their systems, so if you transferred your money somewhere else and never closed your account, it might still have an active balance.
Review your insurance policies
Insurance companies routinely end up owing policyholders refunds on overpayments, policy dividends, inactive policies, and unpaid death benefits. Many people don’t realize these funds exist because they were purchased through employers. Search your old life insurance policies to see if you have any unclaimed funds.
Next, look into auto, home, and even health insurance funds. If you cancel a policy, make a duplicate payment, or your premiums are changed, it sometimes creates refundable balances. Reimbursement errors and overpayments are common with health insurance.
Collect on those class action settlements
If you’ve ever been notified that you’re part of a class action lawsuit, don’t ignore it. Unless you plan on pursuing your own lawsuit, sign up to be part of the settlement. Payouts can range from a few dollars to several thousand, but you won’t know how much each claim is worth unless you sign up when you receive the notice.
You won’t be notified about every class action you can participate in, so search for open class action lawsuits to find out what’s pending.
Recover the money you’re owed
You don’t need to be a financial expert to recover unclaimed cash. State governments make it easy with user-friendly claim processes that anyone can use. And although each payment might look small, every dollar counts.
