Last year it was announced that money left in dormant bank accounts (accounts left idle for a number of years) would start to be distributed to charities.
Halifax has said that it intends to try to reunite holders of dormant accounts holding more than £1,000 with their money in the near future, by advertising and using third-party searchers.
I can’t imagine all banks and building societies would go to the trouble of doing the same, and it’s unlikely many would forget an account with such a large balance, so why not have a think about whether you’ve got any accounts lying around that you’ve not used for a while?
Perhaps you stopped using a bank a few years ago because of the poor service they gave, but you still left a balance in there. Or maybe you opened an account with a few hundred pounds in the hope that you could “carpetbag” when that was all the rage, but have done nothing with it since.
Although you might not be sitting on a goldmine of forgotten cash, it might just be a useful amount to add to other savings, or to treat the kids…