With unclaimed property assets reaching record levels, businesses have become, in some cases, overwhelmed and hamstrung by stagnant, unoptimized processes. That sentiment is compounded by ever-evolving regulatory changes, resulting in organizations struggling to hit compliance deadlines while delivering an optimal claimant experience. Often, early systems had periods of short-term success but are on the verge of obsolescence, resulting in stressed workflows and cumbersome integrations. Deploying an integrated IT infrastructure, supported by cloud-enabled AI, represents the quickest path to modernizing unclaimed property management. A fully integrated IT infrastructure is crucial to optimize the management of unclaimed property [1]. When lone solutions exist across an organization, companies miss out on automation opportunities generated through the interconnectedness of systems and data. AI presents organizations with the opportunity to traverse these gaps, enabling a vast library of applications to improve the perturbed workflows of unclaimed property teams. Automated data extraction, document comparison, fraudulent claim detection, and workflow completion analysis are just a few popular applications well suited for the unclaimed property space. In addition to the lagging technology currently deployed by many organizations, the unclaimed property landscape itself is evolving. Compliance issuance, asset availability, rates, the ability to collect fraudulently posted claims, and the claimant experience have all become hot-button items that are now front of mind for regulation agencies and businesses alike. Issuing duplication letters in a compliant manner, accommodating claimant inquiries regarding held assets, and managing, processing, and understanding the operational impact of rate changes are vexing problems many organizations now find themselves playing catch-up to address. The opportunity posed by cloud-enabled AI is furthered by economic, regulatory, and report cycle pressures on unclaimed property teams to do more with the same size or fewer resources. It’s now no longer simply a case of hitting the audit date deadline and checking off a box but an emerging priority for businesses at all sides of the market, from Fortune 500 to mid-market firms. In-house shared service teams are comfortable in areas of monitoring and curating business data; however, unclaimed property is an unknown territory with a learning curve, compliance gaps, and operational holes that, if ignored, stand to scale up exponentially. The combined fallout from regulatory changes and the recent pandemic have only made the situation riskier, with increased volatility in balancing time-sensitive tasks against stringent regulatory deadlines and growing claimant outreach.
