Before You Sign Anything
How to vet any recovery firm — including us.
If a company says the State is holding your money, you should be able to check every part of that story without trusting the company at all. Here is the checklist we'd use — applied to us, in our own words.
The six questions
1. Do they state their fee as a number?
A firm that won't name its percentage before you ask is planning to negotiate against you. California caps the fee by statute, so there is no reason to hide it.
Us: “California law caps that fee at 10% of the value returned to you (Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 1582), and it is illegal for any investigator to charge more. If nothing is recovered, you owe nothing.”
2. Does the money come to you directly from the State?
Some firms receive your recovery, deduct their cut, and remit the rest. That model requires you to trust them with all of your money. It's worth asking any firm, plainly: who does the State pay?
Us: “When the claim is approved, the State Controller's Office issues payment directly to your business. Your money never passes through our hands — the State's own process pays the owner and the investigator separately.”
3. Do they tell you to verify on the State's own site before signing?
A firm confident in its claims will point you at a lookup it cannot control. A firm that offers only its own search form is asking you to verify them with them.
Us: “Take the Property ID we gave you to claimit.ca.gov — the State of California's official unclaimed-property site — and look it up yourself. … If what you find doesn't match what we told you, walk away.”
4. Are their registrations real, checkable numbers?
Claims like “licensed and bonded” cost nothing to type. Registration numbers can be checked. Ask for them, then check them.
Us: our registration details appear on this site as checkable numbers as they are issued — never as unverifiable badges. If a number isn't shown yet, that's because we won't display anything you can't independently confirm.
5. Is there any upfront cost — for anything?
The State charges nothing to process claims, so any “filing fee,” “search fee,” or deposit is a red flag by itself.
Us: “Nothing upfront, nothing out of pocket, ever. We work on contingency” — and “any owner can file a claim directly with the State Controller's Office, free of charge, at claimit.ca.gov.”
6. Is a human accountable by name?
Someone's name should be on the engagement — a person you can address, not an inbox.
Us: “Kent Trowbridge leads client relationships and oversees every engagement personally — when you work with our firm, you work with him.”
Run this checklist on us. Run it on anyone who contacts you. If a firm fails it and we're the ones who told you how to check — that's the point.