- Nearly GH¢500mn in Dormant Funds Exposes Ghana’s Inheritance and Wealth-Transfer Gap
Ghana’s dormant-account problem is emerging as a wider test of the country’s inheritance and financial-inclusion framework, with nearly GH¢500 million in unclaimed balances raising questions about how efficiently families can recover wealth left behind by deceased relatives.
The Institute for Liberty and Policy Innovation, or ILAPI, has called for reforms to simplify beneficiary access to dormant financial assets, arguing that procedural barriers can turn accumulated savings into what it describes as “inheritance poverty”.
The headline figure is an approximate cedi equivalent rather than a single domestic-currency balance. ILAPI says Bank of Ghana data show that between 2016 and 2024, more than GH¢167.8 million, US$14.6 million, £2.4 million and €2.3 million in dormant balances were transferred to the central bank. It also says 1,448,660 dormant accounts were transferred between 2021 and July 2024.
The scale matters because dormant funds are not simply an accounting category. Behind the balances may be savings accumulated over years of work that beneficiaries are unable, or sometimes unaware that they are entitled, to claim.
Under Ghana’s banking rules, accounts that remain inactive for five years are transferred to the Bank of Ghana, where dormant account holders or their legal representatives can trace unclaimed funds through the central bank’s portal. The framework is intended to protect customer funds while establishing a process through which they can subsequently be reclaimed.
But accessing funds after an account holder dies can be more complicated than many families expect. The Bank of Ghana has clarified that a person named as “next of kin” does not automatically inherit money in a deceased customer’s account. Access generally requires legal authority through probate where there is a will or letters of administration where a person dies intestate.
That distinction helps explain why the process can become difficult for families that lack estate planning, documentation or access to legal assistance.
ILAPI’s policy advocacy says nearly 70% of beneficiaries who attempted to recover dormant assets abandoned the process, while families can face significant costs and delays in establishing entitlement. One assessment cited by the institute estimates claimants can spend around GH¢7,500 and wait more than 32 weeks to access a deceased relative’s funds.
For lower-income households, those frictions can have consequences far beyond banking.
A dormant account may represent school fees, working capital for a small business, medical expenses, housing finance or savings intended to protect children and spouses after the death of a breadwinner. When access is delayed or abandoned, wealth that could strengthen a household balance sheet remains economically stranded.
The problem therefore exposes a less discussed dimension of financial inclusion. Ghana has made progress in encouraging citizens to use formal financial services, digital payments and regulated savings channels. But inclusion is incomplete if it is easier to enter the financial system than to transfer legitimately accumulated wealth when an account holder dies.
Higher-income households are more likely to have wills, lawyers and formal estate plans, and can absorb the costs associated with probate. Families with fewer resources are less likely to have those advantages, meaning the same inheritance system can impose very different economic costs.
ILAPI has consequently proposed a Next of Kin and Beneficiary Access Act that would harmonise procedures across banks, insurers, pension administrators and other financial institutions. It also wants a National Beneficiary Claims Portal, standardised documentation requirements and mandatory notification of known beneficiaries when accounts become dormant or institutions become aware of an account holder’s death.
The proposal would not eliminate the need to verify legal entitlement. Nor should it.
Any reform would have to protect estates against fraud, impersonation, family disputes and unauthorised withdrawals. The objective should be to make legitimate claims predictable and efficient without weakening safeguards around private property.
A centralised digital system could help if it links identity, account-tracing and claims processes while maintaining strict privacy and security controls.
Ghana already has a Bank of Ghana unclaimed-balances portal that allows dormant account holders and legal representatives to trace funds transferred by banks and specialised deposit-taking institutions. A broader framework could build on that infrastructure by improving coordination across institutions involved in inheritance.
Financial institutions must balance customer confidentiality, estate law and the risk of releasing funds to the wrong claimant. Standardised national procedures could reduce uncertainty, establish clearer timelines and create a common evidentiary threshold.
The wider economic case is that dormant wealth is potentially productive household capital.
Money returned to legitimate beneficiaries may finance education, businesses, housing and other assets. At a time when affordable credit remains difficult for many households and small enterprises, inherited savings can provide capital without creating new debt.
A functioning inheritance system allows one generation’s accumulated assets to strengthen the next. When legitimate wealth becomes inaccessible because families cannot navigate the administrative process, each generation risks losing part of the economic progress made by the one before it.
That is why the dormant-account debate belongs within Ghana’s broader discussion about poverty reduction, property rights and financial inclusion.
ILAPI’s proposals will still require scrutiny, particularly over how any new law would interact with existing estate, banking, pension and insurance legislation. The institute itself argues that current requirements are spread across several laws and institutions, creating overlapping procedures for claimants.
But the underlying policy question is difficult to ignore. Ghana has spent years expanding participation in the formal financial system. The next challenge is ensuring that the wealth accumulated within that system can be transferred securely when its owner dies.
Nearly GH¢500 million in dormant balances is therefore more than a banking statistic.
It is a measure of how much household wealth can become disconnected from the people who may ultimately depend on it.
A functioning financial system should not only help citizens accumulate wealth. It should also ensure that legitimate wealth survives the death of its owner and can move securely and efficiently to those legally entitled to receive it.
