Unclaimed Property Reporting Instructions.

DEPARTMENT OF FINANCIAL SERVICES
Division of Accounting and Auditing

RULE NO: RULE TITLE
69I-20.041: Unclaimed Property Reporting Instructions.

NOTICE OF CORRECTION

Notice is hereby given that the following correction has been made to the proposed rule in Vol. 36 No. 3, January 22, 2010 issue of the Florida Administrative Weekly.

The correction adds the following summary of the statement of the estimated regulatory costs:

The number of individuals and entities likely to be required to comply with the rule and a general description of the types of individuals likely to be affected by the rule: There are an estimated 1,539,207 business firms are in Florida. The Small Business Administration estimates that there are 1.9 million businesses in Florida alone. In addition to private business entities, as a general rule, state agencies and local governments are also subject to Florida’s unclaimed property law. Cost to the Department of implementing the proposed rule and any anticipated effect on state revenue: The Department intends to implement the proposed rule within its current workload, with existing staff. For fiscal year 2008/2009, the Department estimates the cost for this reporting staff to be approximately $1,448,000. For fiscal Year 2008/2009, the Department estimates that the amount of unclaimed property received from holders throughout the United States is $298,135,491. Good faith estimate of the transactional costs likely to be incurred: The Department has completed unclaimed property audits of holders which took an average of approximately 47 hours to complete. The Department estimates that the median cost of a bookkeeper is $17.90 per hour. The amount of $17.90 per hour multiplied by 47 hours is an estimated amount of $841.30 to complete an unclaimed property report. Analysis of the impact on small businesses and an analysis of the impact on small counties and small cities: Generally, all businesses and state and local government entities in the United States are required to comply with unclaimed property laws and are, therefore, impacted. Any additional information that the agency determines may be useful: In order to help businesses and local governments reduce the cost of complying with Florida’s unclaimed property law, the Bureau of Unclaimed Property periodically conducts educational workshops and seminars throughout the State of Florida. The Department has also provided individualized assistance at the holder’s place of business.