How to Return a Lost Wallet
Discovering a lost wallet means taking responsibility for getting it back to its owner. After all, you’d hope someone would do the same for you. In this article, we explore what to do if you find a wallet and offer practical steps to ensure its safe return.
Don’t Give Your Wallet to the Nearest Business/Store
First things first, if you have found a wallet, don’t hand it in to a local business or store. Your intent will be good here because you’ll assume the person will return and ask around. However, in doing this, you’re giving a valuable item to a stranger—and you don’t know if they’re trustworthy.
Try to Find Their Contact Information
So, I’ve found someone’s wallet, how do I contact them? As we’ve advised not handing it in to a store, you need to do some detective work yourself and find out some contact information. This is when you go looking in the wallet for key information to aid you in returning it. This might be a driver’s license or a business card, for instance.
Once, in a rush to get to work on time, my husband left his wallet on the top of his car as he drove down the road. When it fell off a few hundred yards from the house, someone found it, found his address inside, and returned it.
How to Find Someone Who Lost Their Wallet?
But, how to find someone who lost their wallet with no address inside? This is when you need to get a little savvy. Here are some of your options:
Search for Them Online (Facebook, X, Instagram)
Nowadays, especially the younger generation, know instantly what to do if you find a wallet: you head online.
If they have a digital footprint, a quick search on Google might yield results. If not, try putting their name into Facebook, X, or Instagram to see what the search turns up. There are about 5 billion users of social networks, so there is a high probability that you will find the owner of the wallet there. If you manage to find them, you can try contacting them through the platform straight away.
Things can be trickier if the person has a common name or if they don’t come up in searches. However, in these cases, you might be able to post in local Facebook groups to see if anyone knows the person and can put you in touch.
Return It to the Nearest Police Station
Another way how to return a lost wallet is by going to the nearest police station. The police will always advise this is where to turn in a lost wallet because the person might report it lost or missing so they can then reunite it. In the meantime, the wallet will be kept safe in the evidence room. If the owner is never found, it will then be destroyed after a set period of time so that no one can get hold of any personal or financial information held within it.
Call/Contact Their Bank or Credit Card Company
Another option after finding a wallet on the ground is to contact one of the banks or credit card companies you find in their wallet. Most people have one or two cards in their wallet. And by calling the number on the back of the card, you will be able to inform them that you’ve found it lost. This also means they might put a block on the card so that it can’t be used by anyone else. Obviously, banks are bound by confidentiality, so they won’t be able to give you any information about the person or where they live, but they might be able to contact them on your behalf.
Use Searqle to Find Phone Number by Name
So, what to do with a lost wallet if those options aren’t available? One resource we’ve not mentioned so far is Searqle. This people search directory can help you find someone’s phone number even if you’ve only got their name. Here’s how to do it:
- Go to Searqle and create an account.
- Enter the person’s name and their state.
- You should see the results and data attached to that person.
One name search can give you so much information, including their full name, phone number, current address, previous addresses, date of birth, relatives, and even aliases. The Searqle people search engine is designed for looking up people and is location-based. So, presuming the person who’s lost the wallet lives in the state where you found it, you’ll be able to track them down this way.
Conclusion: Found Wallet. What Should I Do?
In summary, if you find a wallet, you now have plenty of options to try to help it get back to its owner. Hopefully, you’ll be able to track them down some way or other, which means you can reunite them.
