OF the 507,000 Child Trust Funds (CTFs) opened for young people in the Yorkshire-Humberside region, an estimated 172,000 belong to 16-18 year-olds.
In this age range young people are allowed to take control of their accounts; but account providers report that 58 per cent of 18 year-olds (the age at which they can withdraw their money) have yet to claim their funds, typically worth over £1,000. A huge proportion of these accounts are ‘Addressee Gone Away’ or have never been registered, thus risking losing access to their money. This particularly impacts more disadvantaged young people.
The Share Foundation, working with HMRC and CTF account providers, is hosting a UK-wide series of Virtual CTF Events for young people to help them find their accounts, with the next set for Tuesday, June 22 at 7 pm for the Yorkshire-Humberside region.
Its free search facility, https://findCTF.sharefound.org introduces 60 per cent of young people directly to their account provider within two working days (with the remainder requiring HMRC linkage, arranged by The Share Foundation).
The Virtual CTF Event runs for about 30 minutes with short videos and a breakout session for groups of young people to ask any questions they may have to our CTF ambassadors.
The link to register for the June 22nd event is: https://www.sharefound.org/yorks-humberside
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