subject: Ownerless Goods Ripoff [print this page] The name Bona vacantia , in England, stands for ownerless property that has passed to the crown. This has various names in other countries. In the United States it is simply unclaimed property that goes to the State where it occurred or, in some cases, to the government. However, it is recoverable if one knows about it.
Bank accounts, company assets, property, or anything else that's worth money counts as unclaimed property in these situations. There are cases in which people die, but they haven't designated the recipients of their property or items. Whatever department is responsible for overseeing the money or property holds onto them until such time as an heir or other recipient can collect them as stipulated in some kind of will.
Con men have found that the lure of unclaimed goods or having cash come to people from the blue can be used to perpetrate scams on hopeful victims. It's easy for many to fall into the trap that the email they just got is true and all they have to do is respond and they are rich. Everyday people fall into this trap and are ripped off by con men every day with the lure of money from nowhere.
These unclaimed properties or moneys are not kept secret but advertised in the local paper, or via a website and they may request some basic personal information such as a full name or possibly relatives names and that information is checked against the database to see if there is property for the inquirer. Occasionally names of relatives will be required.
If there are unclaimed goods or funds matching the name of the person inquiring then they are contacted and more details will probably need to be submitted. The entire process takes place via letter or email and there is no agent involved. Knowing how ownerless goods recovery really works helps a person avoid the ripoffs.
Those who wish to scam people through bona vacantia claims just pick email addresses or phone numbers at random and contacts them. You then get an email or a letter from the scammer, informing them of their entitlement to certain withheld and unclaimed funds. The official appearance of the letter will serve to convince you.
The next step is when the victim responds to the communication they will be asked to give their contact details and usually a phone call will be made saying the goods are available but there are expenses or fees that must be paid before it can be released. In almost all cases the victim will not ever see anything from the money they have sent and the requests will continue until it is obvious they will not pay more to the con men. In cases like these knowing whom you are speaking to and being able to verify that with a service such as instant-phone-information.com/404/525/, can save much time and many dollars because it would be immediately apparent the agent is not who he says he is.
Over any other form of payment a bank draft is considered the best by ripoff artists. A personalized bank draft from the victim opens them up for even worse scams and their name, home address, bank account number and sometimes even driver's license number become available to the con men. Sending a personal bank check to con men can make the sender vulnerable to ripoff artists who steal their identity. The proper place for letters of this sort is the garbage can and of course never write back to them, the next step would be to email or write the proper agency to report this type of scam.
