4 Tips to Avoid Unclaimed Investments

Introduction:

Recently ET wealth has released an article wherein it has been reported that unclaimed investments in India are around Rs. 82,000 Crore which can be present in an individual’s Bank Account, FD, Insurance Policy, Mutual Funds, etc. This is an alarming signal as the opportunity loss on these investments is huge. Here is a brief of the article:

Bifurcation of the Unclaimed Investments:

• From the unclaimed investments Rs. 18,381 Crore are from the savings account and current account deposits as per RBI on 31^st March 2019.
• Around Rs. 4,820 Crores are there with the banks as Fixed and Other Deposits which are matured but not withdrawn.
• Around Rs. 15,167 Crores of the unclaimed amounts are there with Life Insurance Companies out of which alone LIC has over Rs. 7,000 Crores.
• Mutual Fund houses have over Rs. 17,880 Crore as inactive funds or unclaimed amounts.
• Employee Provident Fund also has Rs. 4,100 Crore as unclaimed investments.
• Around Rs. 26,497 Crores of the unclaimed amounts are there with Provident Fund Houses.

Tips to avoid Unclaimed Investments:

1. Keep your family informed about all of your investments. Write down all the numbers and details on a single page to ease the process. Don’t over-diversify your portfolio and make the process complex.
2. Always make Nominees in all the investments or have a joint account with the spouse.
3. If you have not made your will, then, do it as soon as possible because it will help a lot to settle any future disputes and get it registered as well.
4. Keep your investment sheet updated every time you modify your investments and also keep that updated in your will as well.

Conclusion:

The amount of Unclaimed Investments in India is huge and we should not get indulged in being a part of these figures. These 4 points should be the priority of every investor if they don’t want to mark their money as unclaimed investments.