Trace forgotten French bank accounts with government tool
€164 million recouped in 2025 from old accounts
200,000 requests to recover funds were made last year
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A service that allows people to recover money from old and forgotten bank accounts or life insurance contracts saw €164 million recuperated in 2025, new data reveals.
The money, left in accounts that had not been touched for several years, was recovered by 174,000 people, with an average of €943 returned per person.
Around 200,000 requests were made, meaning almost 90% of claims were successful according to Le Parisien.
Billions of euros is held by France’s Caisse des dépôts et consignations (CDC, a public investor fund), coming from old bank accounts or accounts of deceased individuals that have not been claimed by heirs, life insurance policies, and even employee savings schemes.
Funds are transferred after a period of inactivity to the CDC, which holds the money for 30 years in a separate account.
Money is dormant and does not accrue interest when held in this cash reserve.
Although it may be used to provide backing for certain projects, funds are only fully transferred to the state after this 30 year period is over, and still legally belongs to the original owners prior to this.
Original owners (or legal heirs) can claim the funds at any point before the 30-year window is up.
In 2025, the contents of 758,000 accounts and contracts totalling over €670 million were transferred to the CDC by banks and other institutions. The CDC holds some €8 billion overall.
Free government tool to check for missing funds
The ‘loi Eckert’ in 2017 led to the creation of the Ciclade website, which allows users to check if they have any funds to recuperate from the CDC.
More requests are expected in the coming years due to the law (which introduces more transparency over the process of accounts being classed as inactive) and wider knowledge of the Ciclade website.
Ciclade is free to use, and requires users to enter basic information such as their name and date of birth to see if they have any funds to recuperate.
If they do, further information on how to recover the funds is given to them based on from where the funds originate.
Sums can take up to two months to arrive, but in some cases can be received in as little as 48 hours.
