Mum finds son, 13, has £800 in lost Child Trust Fund after The Sun helps track it down – and 2million could still cash in
CARER Christine Emson had "no idea" her adopted son Adrian had a Child Trust Fund worth almost £1,000 until The Sun helped her track it down - and almost 2million lost accounts still need to be claimed.
The 49-year-old from the Isle of Wight contacted our team after a family member told her about a Facebook post asking if parents needed help finding lost trust funds.
Almost two million Child Trust Funds, worth an estimated £2billion, have not been claimed by families following the abolishment of the investment scheme in 2011.
All children born on or after September 1 2002 to January 3 2011 were eligible for a fund and parents were sent a voucher to invest.
The amount they received varied depending on their income and the date.
The scheme was designed as a long term savings or investment account for children in the UK but many families lost track of the accounts or never activated them in the first place.
Next September the first recipients of the scheme will turn 18 meaning they can access their savings for the first time - yet a third of the funds are still unclaimed.
On average these accounts are worth £1,600 each.
The Sun helped Christine track down the cash on behalf of her adopted son Adrian, 13, who she took over caring for when her sister died.
"Whilst my sister was alive I was in the process of adopting him. He was taken into care at six weeks when my sister died," Christine told The Sun.
“He was with a couple of foster families and I adopted him when he was nearly two. It is possible one of the foster families set up the trust for him.”
We explained how to contact HMRC and complete a form to find out if Adrian had a fund.
A week later Christine received a letter explaining that Adrian has a Child Trust Fund with HSBC.
She then had to apply to become the registered contact and get a solicitor certified copy of Adrian's new birth certificate, issued after his adoption and name change.
Once she was registered as the contact HSBC were able to tell her that the original government voucher had been £250 but it was now worth just over £800.
How to trace a fund
Your kids might be sitting on a nest egg - here's how to find out.
- If you know the Child Trust Fund provider but have lost access details then you can contact them via this government link:
- If you do not know the fund provider or did not set up the account then you can trace the Child Trust Fund here: This includes adopted children.
- You will be asked to complete an online form and this will include setting up a Government Gateway account if you do not have a user ID.
- Once you have completed the form you should receive a response within 15 days but this may be a letter asking for further information such as a birth or adoption certificate.
She is now hoping that Adrian will have around £1,000 to withdraw when the fund matures in four and a half years time.
But Christine is frustrated that no authorities told her about the fund and if she hadn’t been alerted to our story she may have never claimed it.
She added: "I thought someone would have told me about it. The council, social worker or the foster parents.
“I am really disappointed for him. There must be a lot of people who don't know about these funds. I haven't seen any advertisements."
All children born September 1 2002 to July 31 2010 received at least £250 at birth from the Child Trust Fund scheme.
If the child was born into a family where the household income was £16,190 or less, then the initial payment was £500.
All of these children also got an additional £250 on their seventh birthday. Again lower income families could have got up to £500.
Due to government cut backs children born August 1 2010 to January 1 2011 got £50 at birth if their family was well off, or £100 to £500 if they were of limited financial income based on a variety of measures.
No additional payments were given at age seven. All payments stopped from 1 January 2011.
An HMRC spokesperson said: “We have been working closely with Child Trust Fund providers to help account holders or their parents locate a misplaced account.
"As part of that work we have improved the wording of the National Insurance Notification (NINO) letter.
"The letter is sent out prior to a child’s 16th birthday and draws attention to the fact that they may have a CTF and how to trace it."
The government is also looking at creating a website to help parents trace lost accounts.
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