How can I verify that TLSG is a legitimate business and learn more about your company?

• TLSG is the recognized leader in the unclaimed property identification and recovery industry. TLSG has an A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau (“BBB”), and has been a member with the BBB since 1995. There have been numerous “Excellent” references posted by TLSG clients in the Positive Customer Feedback section of TLSG’s BBB Reliability Report. Additionally, the Customer Complaints section of TLSG’s BBB Reliability Report verifies that TLSG has no client complaints. To confirm TLSG's standing with the BBB please visit the BBB’s website at http://www.bosbbb.org/reports/reliability.asp. You may also contact the BBB by phone at (508) 652-4800.
• TLSG has been in business for more than 16 years and has always been in good standing with its State of incorporation, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Verification of TLSG's corporate status is available by visiting the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Secretary of State’s Corporations Division at: http://corp.sec.state.ma.us/corp/corpsearch/corpsearchinput.asp. To confirm TLSG’s corporate standing you may also reach the Commonwealth’s Corporations Division by phone at (617) 727-9640.
• TLSG's President and General Counsel, Kim Sawyer has been a licensed attorney for 18 years and is a member in good standing of the bars of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the State of New York. Attorney Sawyer's standing with the Massachusetts Bar may be confirmed at the Commonwealth of http://massbbo.org/bbolookup.php. Attorney Sawyer’s standing with the New York Bar may be confirmed by searching http://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/attorney/AttorneySearch.
• Additionally, TLSG is an active member and a former sponsor of the Unclaimed Property Professional’s Organization (“UPPO”), an association committed to developing best practices in the unclaimed property field. Attorney Sawyer was a featured speaker on unclaimed property recovery at the UPPO’s 2009 annual conference.

Will you provide me with references?

• Because of privacy concerns we cannot publish the names or contact information of any individual clients for which TLSG has recovered funds. However, you may view the text of actual letters sent in by TLSG clients. To view those clients, please click here. Additionally, there have been numerous “Excellent” references posted by TLSG clients in the Positive Customer Feedback section of TLSG’s Better Business Bureau’s (“BBB's”) Reliability Report. To view TLSG’s “Excellent” testimonials visit the BBB’s website at http://www.bosbbb.org/reports/reliability.asp. While you are visiting the site we also encourage you to view the Customer Complaints section of TLSG’s BBB Reliability Report, which verifies that TLSG has not had any client complaints.

How did TLSG find me?

• TLSG's research professionals make use of countless historical and contemporary public records including change of address filings, voter registrations, telephone directories, city and town indexes, drivers' records, military registers, marriage and divorce filings, birth and death certificates, property ownership documents, and court records. TLSG’s legal staff also continues to develop its own propriety databases to ascertain additional information.

How did TLSG obtain my personal information?

• TLSG is often able to obtain personal information including: your name, address, partial social security number, etc. through both public records and records directly associated with your funds. However, TLSG follows a strict Personal Information & Privacy Policy to ensure that your personal information is secure and used only to assist TLSG in the rapid recovery of your funds. Please see our Personal Privacy Policy for more details.

What is the source of my unclaimed funds?

• Your unclaimed funds are likely held by a federal, state, county, city or town agency or court. Your unclaimed funds are not being held by any State Abandoned Property Office. We would pleased to advise you of the name of the exact source holding your funds after we recieve back from you the signed documents necessary for TLSG to initiate the recovery of your funds.

Why are unclaimed funds owed to me?

• Typically, your unclaimed funds relate to a payment, which was previously issued in your name but was not presented for payment.

How come I never received the original payment that TLSG has contacted me about?

• Payments are often returned to the issuer as undeliverable mail due to inaccurate, outdated or incomplete mailing addresses. In some cases, the original check may have reached the owner, but has since been considered unclaimed because it was not presented for payment within a required time frame. Another common cause of lost payments is “name changes” as a result of marriage, remarriage or divorce. Minor clerical mistakes such as typographical errors or insufficient postage may also result in you never having received your original payment.

How could I not know that a payment is owed to me?

• Most people, by no fault of their own, are unaware that there are unclaimed funds available for them to claim. In many cases this is because they never realized that they were entitled to the funds in the first place or although they were aware that they were owed the monies, they never thought that they would ever receive payment. For example, you may be owed an outstanding payment from the Department of Energy as a result of a federal rebate to which you were entitled from purchasing a hybrid car, installing a solar hot water heater or replacing windows. However, you may have never been aware of such federal incentive programs in the first place and so you never expected the payment. You may also be due money from a company with which you were employed several years ago that subsequently went out of business. Since you knew that the company went out of business you never expected to receive any of the wages or retirement money that you were owed. These are just a few examples of the many instances where owners of unclaimed funds are unaware of the existence of such funds until they are contacted by TLSG.

How come the government agency, court or representative that originally issued my payment is not doing anything further to get me back my monies?

• Most government agencies have only minimal requirements that they are bound by with respect to locating the owners of outstanding payments. Moreover, these economic times make it exceedingly difficult for government agencies, with very limited resources and significantly reduced staff, to expend the additional capital to implement programs in order to locate the beneficiaries of missing payments when such expenditures are not mandatory.

Can I find my unclaimed funds on my own if I search a State Abandoned Property website or on www.missingmoney.com?

• No, you will not be able to find the funds that TLSG has identified as due back to you on any State Abandoned Property website or at www.missingmoney.com. TLSG does not identify funds or assist individuals in recovering property held by State Abandoned Property offices.

However, TLSG encourages you to visit the State Abandoned Property website where you live and www.missingmoney.com to make sure that there are no additional monies available for you and your family to claim.

• Many payments issued by other governmental agencies and courts are not subject to State Abandoned Property laws and are not and will never become Abandoned Property. Therefore, those payments will never be posted on either a State’s Abandoned Property website or www.missingmoney.com. Moreover, TLSG monitors many federal agencies, cities, counties and towns where statutes of limitations require you to recover your unclaimed funds within a prescribed period of time or forever lose your right to recover your property.

What are the main differences between funds held by “State Abandoned Property Offices” and the “Unclaimed Funds” that TLSG has identified as available for me to recover?

• The names of owners of property held by State Abandoned Property Offices are generally publicized on either a State sponsored website, www.missingmoney.com or in a newspaper. Conversely, the names of the owners of the majority of unclaimed funds that TLSG identifies are not publicized. Additionally, the process involved for individuals to both identify and claim property from State Abandoned Property Offices is typically free and simple. However, the process involved for individuals to both identify and claim property that TLSG has identified as belonging to them often involves research and legal fees and is generally complex. Moreover, an owner typically does not permanently lose his or her right to recover funds held by State Abandoned Property Offices. In many instances, TLSG identifies outstanding payments from sources of which our client's right to claim funds may be extinguished by the passage of time. Such funds must be recovered within a prescribed time period or the client risks forever losing the right to claim their funds. Therefore, it is crucial that an owner file a timely claim in order to prevent the permanent loss of their funds. Another difference between the two categories of unclaimed property is that most funds held by State Abandoned Property Offices originate from an unclaimed payment owed to the owner by an independent third party, such as a bank, retailer, insurance company or utility company. On the contrary, the original issuer of the majority of the unclaimed funds that TLSG identifies as available for recovery is a government agency or a representative of a court.

Can you advise me exactly where my funds are prior to entering an agreement with TLSG?

• TLSG will advise you as to whether your funds are currently held by a governmental agency or court or by a private business. Additionally, if TLSG is aware of the date that the original payment was made TLSG will also disclose that information to you. However, as TLSG has invested significant financial resources and time in researching and identifying these funds as well as verifying that you are the rightful owner of these monies, to protect our interest, TLSG will not disclose the exact location of your funds until an agreement is in place and you have returned to TLSG all the necessary recovery documents.

If I do not act quickly will I lose my right to claim these funds?

• TLSG monitors federal, state, county, and municipal jurisdictions where statutes of limitations require owners to recover unclaimed funds within a prescribed period of time. Once this time period expires, these owners’ rights to recover their property will be lost forever. For example, payments that originate from federal agencies must be claimed within six years from the original issue date or you will lose your right to claim those funds. There are also many counties and cities where after a four-year period they are permitted to 'extinguish' the liability on their books and then keep your money. Nonetheless, even if there is not a time limit during which you must claim your funds, it is always beneficial to act promptly. The faster you recover your money the sooner you will regain control over how your funds are used.

How do I begin recovering my funds?

• To initiate the recovery of your funds, you must return to TLSG a properly notarized Limited Power of Attorney and a signed Professional Services Agreement. Additionally, the entity holding your funds will require a copy of government-issued identification such as a driver's license, passport, state identification card, or a social security card. Should you have changed your name or address, since the payment issued, a verification of this change may also be required. Additionally, on occasion, the entity holding your funds may require further documentation. The entity holding your funds requires these documents to confirm that it is releasing the unclaimed funds to the correct owner or legal beneficiary as opposed to someone attempting to fraudulently gain access to your funds.

Why is a Limited Power of Attorney necessary and what does it authorize TLSG to do?

• The entity holding your funds requires that we present it with documentation, such as a Limited Power of Attorney, verifying that TLSG is authorized to assist you with the recovery of your funds. TLSG's limited power of attorney is completely restricted to assisting you with this one specific recovery and cannot be used for any other purpose. TLSG’s Limited Power of Attorney also has built in protection for you, since it states that TLSG may not incur any costs on your behalf.

Where can I have a document notarized?

• Documents may generally be notarized either free of charge or for a minimal fee. Most banks, real estate offices, city and town halls, state offices and insurance companies offer notary services.

Why does TLSG charge a service fee? What is included in TLSG’s fee? Are there any hidden costs? Is payment requested upfront?

• The contingency fee that TLSG assesses is based on the complexity of identifying and processing your claim, the difficulty in locating you and the size of your claim. TLSG incurs substantial costs and expenses in identifying and recovering our clients’ funds. This includes but is not limited to the following: (1) obtaining and researching the records indicating that funds are owed to you; (2), locating you; (3), preparing and filing the legal documents necessary to claim your funds; (4), retaining outside counsel if necessary; and (5), monitoring the status of your claim through the final payment of your funds to you. TLSG’s fee is inclusive of all of these costs and expenses associated with the recovery of your funds. There are no hidden fees or additional costs and TLSG never requests any payment upfront. Should you not receive the benefit of your payment, TLSG does not receive a fee.

Is there a limit to the fee TLSG may charge for recovery services?

• Many states limit the fees that may be charged for assistance with the recovery of funds that are held by their Abandoned Property Office. However, since TLSG does not identify funds held by State Abandoned Property Offices these limits are generally not applicable to the funds recovery for which we are assisting you. However, should there be an applicable law that limits the fee that TLSG may charge for a recovery, TLSG adheres to the law and will not assess any fee greater than what is legally permissible.

How long should it take to recover my funds?

• The majority of TLSG's clients receive their funds within 120 days from the time that the recovery process is initiated by TLSG. However, depending on the origin of your funds and the unique circumstances surrounding your claim, the recovery time may vary. TLSG will provide you with a more accurate estimate after we have received all of your properly executed recovery documents and the requested supporting documentation.