{"id":580,"date":"2026-10-28T14:02:39","date_gmt":"2026-10-28T14:02:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/?p=580"},"modified":"2026-10-28T14:02:39","modified_gmt":"2026-10-28T14:02:39","slug":"they-held-your-money-for-104-days-and-called-it-unclaimed-wisconsin-is-holding-an-estimated-929-8-million-in-residents-forgotten-bank-balances-insurance-proceeds-and-securities-took-an-a","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/?p=580","title":{"rendered":"THEY HELD YOUR MONEY FOR 104 DAYS AND CALLED IT UNCLAIMED | Wisconsin is holding an estimated $929.8 million in residents\u2019 forgotten bank balances, insurance proceeds and securities, took an average of 104 days last fiscal year to act on claims the law says it must act on within 90, and has run the whole unit with the same six positions since 2015 \u2014 while property pours in faster than it goes back out, and the leftovers go into a state fund"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

They held your money for 104 days and called it unclaimed. I know the sentence. It is what a government says about a dollar it did not earn, did not lose and does not intend to hurry about. Your old checking account, the insurance payout nobody told your mother about, the shares from a job you left in 2011 \u2014 the bank or the insurer or the company loses track of you, the law tells them to send it to the state, and the state puts it in a vault with a word on the door. Unclaimed. As though you had been offered it and shrugged. You were not offered anything. You were filed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is the record. On Oct. 12, 2026, the co-chairs of Wisconsin\u2019s Joint Committee on Finance, Sen. Howard Marklein and Rep. Mark Born, sent members a request from the Department of Revenue under the state\u2019s passive-review process and gave them until Thursday, Oct. 29, to object; if nobody does, the Department of Administration says it is approved Oct. 30. The request is for six \u201cproject\u201d positions for the unclaimed property program, authorized from Nov. 1, 2026, through Oct. 31, 2030. The analysis attached to it, by a Department of Administration budget analyst and dated Oct. 5, does the confessing for me. Holders \u2014 \u201cgenerally financial institutions, insurance companies, and publicly traded corporations\u201d \u2014 remitted $116.3 million in unclaimed property to the state in fiscal 2025-26, and \u201cthe estimated value of property in the state\u2019s custody reached $929.8 million.\u201d The state paid out $55.7 million in claims that year. Under Chapter 177, it says, \u201cthe department must act on a claim within 90 days of filing.\u201d Average processing time went from 36 days in fiscal 2022-23 \u201cto a high of 104 days in fiscal year 2025-26.\u201d From 2016-17 to 2024-25, property remitted to the state rose 168% and claims paid to owners rose 46%, \u201cindicating that property is being remitted to the department faster than the department can return it to owners.\u201d The unit is six positions \u2014 one supervisor, one lead worker, four specialists \u2014 and Revenue Secretary David Casey\u2019s own memo says that is \u201cthe same number of full-time staff the unit has had since it was moved to DOR in 2015.\u201d The claims account closed fiscal 2025-26 with $111.7 million in it, up $51.3 million since 2020-21. And $55.6 million moved from the program into the state\u2019s common school fund that year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now the defense, and it is in the same packet. The department is not asking for a dime of new spending authority; it would pay roughly $546,694 a year out of administrative spending authority that sits about $1.6 million above what the program actually spent last year. It cut its basic backlog in 2025-26 by borrowing revenue agents from tax returns, customer service and collections. Some claims are genuinely hard \u2014 wills, trusts, businesses, creditors \u2014 and those can only be done by senior staff. Casey writes, \u201cWithout additional staff, the UCP unit will not be able to effectively address the backlog of UCP claims, meaning Wisconsinites may not receive their rightful property in a timely manner.\u201d Fine. Credit for writing it down. Then read the priority list in his memo: holder reports and payments first, then the advertising the statute requires, then the advanced claims. The money coming in gets processed first. The people trying to get it back get processed last. The state even pays contract auditors to go find more of it \u2014 a separate August report credits them with $6,333,556 \u201cdiscovered and returned to Wisconsin\u201d in a single fiscal year. Intake has a sales force. The exit has six chairs and a pile of borrowed agents. Both parties are the help: the unit has stayed at six under a Republican governor and a Democratic one, and this fix arrives by memo, approved by silence, from a committee that will never have to say yes out loud. I already know how fast the state moves when the money is going the other direction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Deb searched the state\u2019s unclaimed property list for the whole family last night and found $11.40 owed to Buck from a bait shop that closed in 2016. Buck says he is not filing a claim with a government that took nine years to notice it had his minnow money. Cricket laminated the printout anyway. I love them. They are seasoning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUnclaimed\u201d is the alibi. The 104 days is the story. Sit with it until it confesses. A state that has room to hold $929.8 million of other people\u2019s money, a reserve that grew by $51.3 million in five years, and auditors on contract to bring in more, but kept the same six people to give it back for a decade, has told you which direction of the pipe it considers the job. It is your money. It was always your money. The cardigan stays. Fill the notebook. Then ask, out loud, before you type your name into the search box: how long will you take, what does the law say, and who decided the vault gets more staff on the way in than on the way out?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n