2023 Wisconsin Statutes & Annotations
Chapter 177 - Uniform unclaimed property act.
177.0306 - Traveler's check, money order, or similar instrument.
177.0306 Traveler's check, money order, or similar instrument. Sums payable on a traveler's check, money order, or similar instrument presumed abandoned are subject to reporting to and custody of this state and the administrator may take custody of such sums to the extent permitted under 12 USC 2501 to 2503.
History: 2021 a. 87; 2021 a. 240 s. 30.
Under the federal Disposition of Abandoned Money Orders and Traveler's Checks Act, 12 USC 2501 to 2503, the proceeds of a money order, traveler's check, or other similar written instrument (other than a third-party bank check) escheat to the state of purchase upon abandonment, so long as purchase-location information is known and that state has enacted laws empowering it to take custody of those proceeds. When a financial product operates like a money order—in other words, when it is a prepaid written instrument used to transmit money to a named payee—and when it would also escheat inequitably solely to the state of incorporation of the company holding the funds under the common-law rules due to recordkeeping gaps, then it is sufficiently “similar" to a money order to fall presumptively within the Act. Delaware v. Pennsylvania, 598 U.S. ___, 143 S. Ct. 696, 215 L. Ed. 2d 24 (2023).
