WA Treasury’s updated Register of Unclaimed Money has a $170 million pile waiting to be plundered
Is the cost-of-living crisis dashing your dreams?
Do you feel like you need to remortgage your home before you visit Coles or Woolies for the weekly shop?
Are the proceeds from the monthly containers-for-change run the difference between the household budget being in the red or black?
Wish you had a spare few grand lying around that you had forgotten about?
Here’s some good news — you might!
The WA Treasury has just updated its Register of Unclaimed Money and there is a $170 million pile ready to be plundered.
The funds are held by the State Government and come from WA-based organisations that have tried but failed to return cash to people who have overpaid on utility bills, missed dividend payments or not collected refunds on rental bonds, vehicle licences or education providers.
Each year WA’s treasury wonks update the register and the just-released 2024 list has an extra 147,000 new records, including individual unclaimed sums of up to $165,000.
The register now itemises 1.2 million IOUs totalling more than $170 million.
To see if you are owed any cash, visit wa.gov.au/treasury/unclaimed-money or use the ServiceWA app.
It costs nothing to claim what’s rightfully yours. In 2023 more than $2 million was returned to those who were owed money.
Camera IconThere’s millions of dollars waiting be claimed. Credit: NewsWire
“The Register of Unclaimed Money continues to grow and there would be many Western Australians who wouldn’t be aware of outstanding money owed to them,” WA Treasurer Rita Saffioti said.
“It’s very easy to check the register online or via the ServiceWA app, so I encourage all Western Australians to take these simple steps and check if they’re entitled to any of the funds.
“Importantly, in Western Australia there is no time limit to claim funds and there are no fees charged for returning money to the rightful owners.”
The most common kind of unclaimed fund are dividends — accounting for almost a third of the total pool — followed by driver and vehicle licence refunds from the Department of Transport, refunds on utility bill overpayments and payments to deceased estates beneficiaries.
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