Knowledge

Tell us what you are looking for and what you still have: a certificate, a policy document, a passbook, a folio number, an invoice, or in many cases nothing but a name and an approximate year. We will search what is publicly searchable, tell you what appears to be there, and set out what recovering it would involve. That first assessment is free and carries no obligation.

We spend most of it listening and asking for detail, because these matters turn on small facts: which name the asset was held in, whether anyone has died, whether an employer still exists, whether a company has changed its name. By the end you should know what appears to exist, what the realistic route to it is, roughly how long it takes, and whether you need us at all.

Yes. Almost all of this work is done with registrars, companies, funds, insurers and authorities that are dealt with in writing and online rather than in person, so where you live makes very little difference. We act for clients across India and for people living abroad with assets left behind in India, which is a large part of this practice. Where a matter needs an appearance before a court or tribunal, that is agreed separately and, where the forum requires it, conducted by counsel in the right jurisdiction.

Yes. Everything you share is treated as confidential from the first conversation, whether or not you go on to engage us. That includes the fact that you have an asset worth recovering, which is not information anybody should be circulating on your behalf.

The first search and assessment is free. After that, a single claim is ordinarily a fixed fee agreed in writing before work starts, and larger matters running across several institutions, or a business debtor ledger, are quoted against the work the file actually needs. Out of pocket costs such as stamp paper, notarisation, courier, advertisement charges and any court or registry fee are yours and are itemised before they are incurred.

No, and the reason matters more than the answer. Our Fee and Refund Policy rules out contingency and success fees, and it rules out taking any interest in the subject matter of a claim. So we are paid for the work, on a fee agreed in writing before the work starts, whatever the claim eventually produces. In this industry that is worth saying out loud. A great deal of unclaimed asset recovery is sold on a percentage, and a percentage gives the adviser a reason to keep pursuing a claim that should have been abandoned, and no reason at all to tell you that you could have filed it yourself for nothing. It also means we never ask an institution to pay us out of your money, which in some of these matters is not permitted in any event.

No. Several of the searches that matter here are public and free, and charging you to run a free search would be difficult to justify. If the search answers your question and you can make the claim yourself, we will tell you how and that will be the end of it.

Within one business day for a first enquiry. Once engaged, you get a named point of contact and written reporting at agreed intervals, because these matters run in months rather than weeks and silence is the thing clients find hardest.

Honestly, longer than anyone would like, and the variable is usually not us. A claim where the documents are clean and the holder is alive and identifiable can run in weeks. A claim needing a company to certify an entitlement, or a succession position to be established through a court, runs to many months, because those timelines belong to the company or the court. We give a realistic range at the assessment rather than an encouraging one, and we tell you when something has stalled instead of waiting for you to ask.

In writing, in plain language, at intervals agreed at the start, and immediately when something material happens. You should never have to chase us to find out where your matter stands. At the end you get a written record of what was recovered and the correspondence that produced it.

Yes, and we would rather you knew. Searching for an unclaimed bank deposit on the Reserve Bank's public facility is free. Checking unclaimed amounts with insurers through the regulator's facility is free. Searching for inactive mutual fund folios through the industry facility is free. Filing Form IEPF-5 carries no fee to the claimant. Withdrawing a provident fund balance through the member portal is free where your records are in order. Complaining to an insurance ombudsman is free. If your matter is one of those and your documents are clean, do it yourself. What people pay us for is the part these routes do not cover: proving that a 1994 folio in a maiden name is yours, establishing who inherits, or dealing with an institution that has refused.

Ask four things. Does it want your internet banking credentials, card details or a one time password, which no legitimate adviser ever needs. Does it charge a fee for a search that is publicly free. Does it offer to collect an unclaimed bank deposit itself and hand you a share, which is not permitted. And does it promise you a result, which nobody can. This is an area with a real fraud problem, and the safest habit is to make every claim yourself, to your own institution, into your own bank account.

We do not act where the heirs to an estate disagree about who is entitled, because that is a succession dispute and each side needs its own representation. We do not pursue somebody else's asset for a person who has not established their entitlement to it, and clause 4A of our Anti-Money Laundering and Client Due Diligence Policy explains how we satisfy ourselves on that. We do not practise criminal defence, family law or taxation. And we will not take a mandate we do not think is worth pursuing, which happens often enough to be worth mentioning.