Bank launches drive to find lost customers

18 June 2008

Lloyds TSB aims to remind customers about forgotten money

Lloyds TSB has announced that it will be striving to reunite customers with money lying dormant in bank accounts.

There are 120,000 dormant personal and business accounts holding a combined total of £69m, with the average amount untouched at £575. However, the bank reported that 10% of the customers had left over £1,000 in their forgotten accounts.

A bank account is said to be dormant when it has not been touched for at least 15 years.

The bank plans to advertise the fact that the money is lying there untouched and has also taken on a specialist tracing agency to find the account holders.

Its plans will also target customers currently with Cheltenham and Gloucester, Lloyds TSB’s mortgage lending arm.

“These accounts have been long forgotten and our aim is to reunite as many customers as possible with their cash,” said Helen Weir of Lloyds TSB.

“As customers change address, open multiple accounts and their circumstances change, despite our best efforts to keep in touch, it’s surprisingly easy for them to lose track,” she explained.

If you think you may have money lying dormant in an old account, you can use the online account tracing service called My Lost Account, launched in January of this year with the aim of reuniting forgotten funds with rightful owners.

Visit www.mylostaccount.org.uk for further information about how to trace your lost account.