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Returning Unclaimed Retirement Dollars

What happens to my retirement dollars if I’m not around to collect them? Many have wondered this – and many have never gotten a clear answer, leaving their funds in limbo upon their passing.

In fact, the Advisory Council on Employee Welfare and Pension Benefit Plans (ERISA Advisory Council) estimates that about $100 million becomes unclaimed retirement monies every year. They continue by saying that under the current regulations, those funds “are unlikely to be reunited with the beneficiary.” That’s a problem – especially when one considers that this is money hardworking people have spent a lifetime earning.

As many know, the State Treasury already has the responsibility of returning some kinds of unclaimed money to our citizens, and we have a system in place that does it pretty well. In fact, my team alone has returned more than $100 million (granted, a record-breaking milestone) to Mississippians since I took office in January 2020.

Moreover, we have systems in place to verify the rightful owners, reduce fraud, and process millions of individual owner claims. Our team has put innovative technologies in place and dedicated hardworking staff to proactively reunite individuals with their money. And we maintain a public, searchable database (treasury.ms.gov/search) to help folks through the matching process.

Despite these capabilities, the Employee Benefits Security Administration is not currently allowed to transfer uncashed plans to state unclaimed money programs, like the one we run at the Mississippi Treasury.

Earlier this year, I joined with a bipartisan group of State Treasurers to request that the U.S. Department of Labor finally grants state unclaimed property programs access to these funds through the nationwide SURCH program. The SURCH program is a web-based platform for retirement plans to voluntarily transfer unclaimed money to all state programs through a single, streamlined reporting system. This would help us get this money back to families more quickly and efficiently.

The money being held is not that of a retirement system nor is it the government’s; it is your money, and you deserve it returned as swiftly and securely as possible. State Unclaimed Money programs can do it – and want to do it. Fortunately, I’m hopeful that we’re on the cusp of a small policy change that will make a monumental difference in the lives of hardworking families.

As always, if you need anything from my office, please (601) 359-3600.