Careers
Reuniting Owners with their Unclaimed Property
Controller John Chiang has made extraordinary progress in improving the process of reuniting owners with their unclaimed property. See the charts below for more details on the Controller's record through the 2010-2011 fiscal year.
See the chart above as a PDF.
More Charts:
- Shares of Unclaimed Securities Returned to Owners by State Controller and Holders - from Fiscal Year 1997-98 through 2010-11
- Unclaimed Cash Returned to Owners by State Controller and Holders- from Fiscal Year 1997-98 through 2010-11
- Unclaimed Property Notices Mailed to Owners by State Controller - from Fiscal Year 1997-98 through 2010-11
Shortly after assuming office in January 2007, the Controller Chiang successfully sponsored legislation to lift a law that prohibited him from notifying 80 percent of property owners that their cash, stocks, deposits and other valuables had been sent to the State for safekeeping and were available to be claimed. The new law also allows the Controller to notify owners when their property is about to be sent to the State, giving owners the opportunity to reestablish contact with the business, or have their property sent directly to them.
In the first year under the reform law, the Controller's Office sent 2.5 million notices to property owners – more than double the 1.2 million sent out in the previous decade. Without the law, only 499,000 notices would have been mailed to owners, instead of the 7.5 million notices mailed through the end of April 2012.
With the law authorizing him to notify owners of property both before and after it comes to the State, the Controller turned his attention to those whose property was sent to the State during the time the Controller's Office was barred from telling owners about their property. The Controller instructed staff to send notices to all owners whose property has been sent to the State since 1990. The final 11,000 of these notices were sent in April 2010, ensuring that all owners of property with a Social Security number attached have received a notice about their property.
Between January 2007 and December 2012, Controller Chiang reunited owners with $2.3 billion of property that had been lost or forgotten – $1.3 billion that had been sent to the State, and $981 million that was reclaimed by owners from the business before it was sent to the State. During the first four years of his administration, Controller Chiang also returned almost 157 million stocks and securities to owners, which is more than 25 times the amount returned to owners during the previous decade.
Controller Chiang also established a Property Owner Advocate's Office to assist individuals, businesses and local governments that have been unable to resolve their property claims in a timely manner. The Advocate works with the claimant to use all administrative remedies available to resolve the claim. The Advocate also works with the Unclaimed Property Division to implement procedures and policies to continuously improve customer service. For more information, visit the Property Owner Advocate's Office web pages.
Controller Chiang also has expanded the searchable Unclaimed Property database available on his website. The database now provides information about property that has been reported as about to be sent to the State, and provides information so that property owners can contact the business holding the property and reestablish their accounts or have the property directly returned to them.
In addition to Spanish and English, individuals, businesses, governmental and non-profit agencies now can search for their property in Chinese, Tagalog, Korean, Vietnamese and Armenian.