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Do you have an unclaimed Child Trust Fund?

A press release recently published by HMRC revealed that 758,000 young people between the ages of 18 and 23 have a Child Trust Fund which has matured but which they have not claimed. The average Child Trust Fund account is worth £2,242.

Nature of a Child Trust Fund

A Child Trust Fund is a tax-free savings account that was available for children born between 1 September 2002 and 2 January 2011. The scheme closed in 2011.

Payments of up to £9,000 a year can be made into an existing Child Trust Fund. The money in the account belongs to the child. They can take control of the account when they reach the age of 16 but can only withdraw the money once they have reached the age of 18. Interest on money held within the account is tax-free.

Finding a Child Trust Fund

Where the Child Trust Fund provider is known, the account holder can contact the provider to locate a missing account. If the provider is not known, the account holder’s parent or guardian may be able to help. If they do not know the provider, the account holder can ask HMRC using the dedicated online service. HMRC will be able to tell the account holder where the account was originally opened.

The online service was used by more than 563,000 people in the 12 months to the end of August 2025.

To use the service, the account holder will need their National Insurance number. If they do not know this, they can find it on the HMRC app. If the account holder was adopted, they will also need details of their adoption. Where a parent or guardian is using the online tool to find an account, they will need the child’s full name, address and date of birth and also any previous names that they or the child have used. If they know the child’s National Insurance number, they can provide this too.

It is important to have the information to hand as the form must be completed in one go – it is not possible to save a partially completed form and come back to it later.

The service will only supply details of the provider; it will not tell the account holder or their parent or guardian how much money is in the account. The account holder will need to contact the provider to ascertain the account balance.

03/11/2025