‘’Lessons from a 15-Year Marriage and Unclaimed Dividends”
I have been married for so long, I can’t even remember my maiden name…lol, jokes. It’s been just 15 years.
For some reason I ‘woke up’ and realised I have shares I bought when I was in school (between 1999 and 2005) newly learning financial literacy.
Back then dividends were sent as cheques. My address was my parents’ and I was never there, so my cheques were always already stale by the time I saw them.
Unfortunately, I never got to enjoy the dividends I sacrificed my pocket money to buy. The dividends are not a lot of units, but imagine how much 1 unit of Oando shares are worth now.
I tracked down the custodian for a particular share I have and asked them to enrol me in e-dividend so I can get all my unclaimed dividends. The shocker! among all the documents they asked for is official IDs in both my present and maiden name. WHAT!!! ID in my maiden name? That was ages ago!
This wouldn’t have been a big deal, considering I’m meticulous and keep records, but during one of my cleaning routines, just late 2023, I found the last International passport in my maiden name. I looked at it and wondered why I was still keeping it, so I brought out a pair of scissors and cut, cut, cut, dumped it in the bin.
Now the custodian is asking for it. Why didn’t they ask a few months back? Well, who is to blame? What they are asking for is ridiculous, my marriage certificate and newspaper publication change of name should be sufficient, right? They even asked me to swear an oath of affidavit, which I did. What do they need an ID in a name I stopped using 15 years ago for?
Whilst their request is unreasonable, the only person I can blame is myself, not for discarding the ID (because I obviously don’t have a need for it), but because I SHOULD HAVE SIMPLY SCANNED THE PASSPORT PAGES TO KEEP IN MY DIGITAL CLOUD STORAGE!!!!!!
This for me is actually a common practice, I convert almost everything (photo, important documents) to a digital copy and keep them in cloud storage. But in this particular instance, only God knows why, I probably was not thinking much of it.
Everyone should SAFELY KEEP an electronic copy of their important documents, recent or expired. You may need it on the go, lose the physical document and need a replacement, or regulations may change and have a need for it after several years, just like in my case. All you will need is to retrieve it from your PASSWORDED cloud storage. And now the scanners are on our mobile phones, so what’s the excuse?
Digitalisation is an important part of our life and businesses, especially in the unpredictability of life’s nuances, and the necessity of keeping our personal, organisational and business affairs in order.
We are our own organisation and should take every part of our life, including storage and archiving, as seriously as business organisations do.
My dividend is still hanging in the balance. I hope I find an electronic copy of that passport somewhere someday… Wish me luck.
💻 #DigitalArchiving #LifeLessons #digital #archiving #responsibility
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