£290 million in unclaimed windfalls at Standard Life

Howard Lake | 8 January 2007 | Blogs

According to The Guardian, there is £290 million worth of windfall shares currently lying unclaimed at Standard Life following its stock market flotation in July 2006. One policyholder has £136,000 worth of unclaimed shares, and six other shareholders have also failed to claim six-figure sums.
What can fundraisers do about this large sum of unused money and the group of owners who haven’t spotted they are missing it? Not a lot, except lament it is not being put to better use. Alternatively, they might mention this fact in their supporter newsletter and hope that any supporters reunited with their windfall as a result might choose to thank the charity generously for doing so.
The only other choice is to hope that it doesn’t get claimed because any such shares unclaimed by 10 July 2016 will be used for general corporate purposes “which may include charitable giving”, reports The Guardian.

About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale. He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.