Finding Unclaimed Funds in United States Bankruptcy Courts

The United States bankruptcy courts have over $200 millions of unclaimed funds. A fund is said to be unclaimed if it was not paid to the claimant. When the bankruptcy trustee issues check to pay the debts of the creditors, sometimes it happens that the check returns due to wrong address, change of address or failure of the claimant to cash the check within 90 days. Such undelivered checks have to be deposited by the bankruptcy trustee to the bankruptcy court and they are known to be unclaimed funds. These unclaimed funds cannot be withdrawn without a court order.

Locating Unclaimed Funds

If you want to find whether you are entitled to one of such unclaimed fund in the US bankruptcy courts, then you can find them out by filling a simple form in the website of the US Courts. You will have to fill in the name of the debtor and creditor along with the bankruptcy case number. You can make use of this service free of charge. If you are not able to use the internet facility, you can contact federal information centre to get details of the agencies that give a list of unclaimed funds.

Public Notice of Unclaimed Funds

At times you can get a public notice of unclaimed funds by states bankruptcy courts. If you get a chance to view this list of unclaimed funds, you can see that it gives the name of the debtor, the bankruptcy case number, the name of the claimant and at last the amount due to the claimant.

Availing Unclaimed Funds

If you have found that you are entitled to receive the money due to you from the unclaimed fund, you have to obtain a special order from the court. You can also avail of the amount your parent or spouse owes, provided you have their authorization.

You should present a petition to the court and give a notice to the United States attorney to issue the payment lying in the unclaimed fund. This petition has to be filed with necessary evidence documents to establish the right of your ownership. Application forms for placing a petition can be availed through internet. You should provide details like name and address of the claimant, social security and tax id of the claimant and the amount the claimant owes.

Getting Legal Help

This information just provides an overview of finding the unclaimed funds. However, doing it all by yourself might be confusing and time consuming. Hence, you can take the legal advice of an experienced attorney in this regard.