New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli recently announced that Bronx residents have $353,393,103.00 in unclaimed funds waiting to be paid.

 

According to the State comptroller’s office, banks, insurance companies, corporations and the courts are among the many organizations required by law to report dormant accounts to the State comptroller. These organizations must attempt to notify residents by mail regarding such dormant accounts, and publish the information in newspapers.

 

According to the City, monies paid to the courts for legal matters, are held in an interest-bearing, NYC Department of Finance common trust account. Deposits and withdrawals of court funds are made through court orders. If funds are not claimed after three (3) years, they are sent to the NYS Comptroller’s Office as abandoned property.

 

“We’re currently processing paper claims submitted by mail that we acknowledged on or before August 26, 2021,” a statement on the State Comptroller’s website reads. “Information isn’t readily available about claims submitted after that date.”

 

The comptroller’s office said many funds have remained unclaimed and have been turned over to the Office of the State Comptroller. To the best of our knowledge, Norwood News has not received any information about such dormant accounts from any bank, insurance company, the courts or any other organization. We have since reached out to a random selection of Bronx-based banks and insurance companies, and have also placed an inquiry about court assets, and will update this story upon receipt of any feedback we receive.

 

The types of unclaimed funds accounts include the following:

• Bank Accounts – savings, checking and CDs
• Court Funds
• Dividends
• Estate Proceeds
• Insurance Benefits/Policies
• Stocks, Bonds, Mutual Funds
• Telephone/Utility/Security Deposits

 

Bronxites can visit osc.state.ny.us/unclaimed-funds to see if any of these funds belong to them.

 

The statement on the State comptroller’s website continued, “We process online claims within two weeks. If you filed a paper form, it takes longer to process because we must open, sort, and scan it before we can start processing it.”

 

Residents who received a letter from the State Comptroller’s office can here to search by the OUF Code found in the letter.

 

In other news from the State comptroller’s office, as previously reported, DiNapoli published an economic report on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Bronx in June 2021. It found that the borough is comprised of mostly small businesses, and in the ten years leading up to the pandemic, businesses in The Bronx increased by 15.3 percent, This was a faster growth rate than seen in both Manhattan and Staten Island.

 

The report found that the sudden and dramatic closure of businesses amid the pandemic across New York City hit the leisure and hospitality sector the hardest, as an earlier report from DiNapoli detailed. In the Bronx, it meant the loss of 9,600 jobs ,  a 45.6 percent drop   in that sector by the summer of 2020.

 

Since most businesses in the borough are small businesses, the measures put in place to combat the health impacts of the COVID-19 virus forced many of these small businesses to close. Some, but not all, business owners were able to rely on economic relief to stay afloat. The comptroller’s report also found that programs such as the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans served as vital resources to some but were slow to reach all businesses in the borough.