Unclaimed money totalling over $973,085 pa'anga, held in 1582 customer accounts by commercial banks in Tonga, will be transferred to the government and will become government property, if the accounts remain unclaimed. The account holders have until November to make their claims to their own banks, the National Reserve Bank Tonga announced on 28 August.

After that claims will have to be made to the National Reserve Bank before the listed individual expiry dates.

The three commercial banks that hold  the $973,085.05 Unclaimed Monies are the Bank of the South Pacific, the Australia and New Zealand Banking Groups Ltd. and the Tonga Development Bank.

A majority of the 1582 accounts of the Unclaimed Monies are with the BSP, followed by the ANZ and the TDB.

The largest unclaimed account holds $174,958, in the name of of the Christchurch Earthquake Appeal Fund. The others range from $33,855 for Cable and Wireless to the smallest individual account of 0.02.

There are also a number of interesting unclaimed accounts, including a number in the names of Royal Family members. The late King George Tupou V (whose image still appears on some bank notes) has an unclaimed account holding $34,056.77, while another account of the late Queen Mother HM Halaevalu Mata’aho, holds $3,898.82.

A number of the unclaimed accounts belong to clubs, associations and committees, as well as church groups family groups and even one retirement fund.