Not like we didn’t see more of this coming given the huge state budget deficits that exist for most states right now.

While so far the legislation is only a proposal, it is one of the more ominous such unclaimed property policies we have seen.  Under the proposed legislation, gift cards would be considered dormant and be grabbed by the state after only one year.  While, in theory at least, if you tried to get the value back the state is supposed to give it back to you, I can think of quite a few ways the state could make this very difficult to discourage people actually getting their gift card value back.

It does like this:

1. Consumer lets card sit in a drawer for a year
2. State grab gift card
3. Consumer tries to use gift card, but it fails
4. Consumer can’t figure out what is going on and issuing company is no help
5. State doesn’t actually make any effort to find the rightful owner of the gift card

And the money is lost.

Isn’t the government supposed to be helping its constituents?