Hurdles in applying for unclaimed money

I WISH to highlight some of the difficulties encountered in submitting claims to the Registrar of Unclaimed Money.

I went to the office of the Registrar of Unclaimed Money at Komtar, Penang, with the intention of submitting a claim in respect of dividends from public-listed companies accruing to my father who passed away in 2002.

The unclaimed money division gave me a list of unclaimed dividends accruing to my father both before and after his death. I was puzzled upon being told that I had to write to each of the 17 public-listed companies to obtain confirmation that they had, in fact, paid the unclaimed dividends to the registrar.

Furthermore, I was instructed to obtain a court order amending the details of his assets attached to the Grant of Probate at the date of his death in 2002, notwithstanding that some of the dividends were only declared after his death.

Apart from the fact that this would incur extra legal expenditure, which may be disproportionate to the amount of money unclaimed, can we honestly include dividends that were declared subsequent to his death as part of his estate as at the date of his death?

When I pointed out these inconsistencies, especially the fact that it was unnecessary to obtain confirmation from each of the 17 public-listed companies given that the unclaimed money division itself had a list of monies handed over to them, the officer only said that this was the standard operating procedure.

Could the Accountant General’s Office provide an explanation?

QUO VADIS

Penang

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