Computershare > News and Insights > Computershare Connection
Companies across Canada hold millions of dollars in unclaimed property, including uncashed dividend and interest payment cheques, and unexchanged shares following a corporate action.
There are several reasons why property remains unclaimed, and shareholders are “lost”:
- Shareholders move and do not update their address information, so they do not receive documentation or payments
- A shareholder passes away and did not include their investments as part of the estate
- Shareholders neglect to exchange their old shares or submit a claim when there is a merger, acquisition, reverse stock split or other corporate action
In Canada, unclaimed property legislation originates at the provincial level, with only five provinces instituting this legislation – Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba and Quebec, with New Brunswick as the latest province to join this list. The specified time period for property to be considered unclaimed varies by province.
Generally, provincial unclaimed property legislation states that companies or their agents who are holding the specified property types are obligated to remit qualifying properties to provincial administrators, often after a notice has been mailed to the last known address of the holder. With provincial audits increasing in frequency, companies may be at risk of fines and penalties for not taking care of unclaimed property responsibilities in a timely manner.
Before this occurs, many companies take actions to reunite lost shareholders with their property. But it can be a time-consuming task to track the owners of unclaimed property, perform the required due diligence, and either successfully update shareholder information or remit any outstanding unclaimed property to provincial governments.
As transfer agent and registrar for corporations and issuers of securities, Computershare is well-positioned to manage the unclaimed property liability of our clients through an established monitoring, notification and remittance process to relevant jurisdictions. Computershare also provides asset reunification services to our clients to help reduce the number of lost holders and the amount of property eligible under unclaimed property legislation.
There are updates coming to unclaimed property regulations in Canada. Stay tuned for the next issue of Computershare Connection when we will report on these changes.