Help me track down this wallet's owner
July 4, 2012 6:22 PM Subscribe
I found a wallet on the street today. All the money and credit cards and other ID were still in it. I would very much like to put it back into the owner's hands directly. Help me track this person down!
I've done a bit of phone number directory searching and Googling, to no avail (the address does match up on Spokeo.com, but I don't want to pay for the info). I could just drop it off at the local NYC police precinct or the person's college lost and found (assuming that the City College ID is current), but I would prefer to be able to find the person's phone or email and contact her directly. Do any of you have any tricks for finding this sort of contact info? I have also considered making a "found wallet" sign and tacking it up around the neighborhood.
I've done a bit of phone number directory searching and Googling, to no avail (the address does match up on Spokeo.com, but I don't want to pay for the info). I could just drop it off at the local NYC police precinct or the person's college lost and found (assuming that the City College ID is current), but I would prefer to be able to find the person's phone or email and contact her directly. Do any of you have any tricks for finding this sort of contact info? I have also considered making a "found wallet" sign and tacking it up around the neighborhood.
I'm assuming there was no drivers license?
Many college websites have an email directory; try searching the website for the email. If they're still in school (or recently were), the email should be valid. If that doesn't work, you could call the school and ask for a contact email.
posted by DoubleLune at 6:27 PM on July 4, 2012
Many college websites have an email directory; try searching the website for the email. If they're still in school (or recently were), the email should be valid. If that doesn't work, you could call the school and ask for a contact email.
posted by DoubleLune at 6:27 PM on July 4, 2012
Could you just call the number on the back of a credit card and report it as found? I'd imagine there's a chance they might be able to contact the owner.
posted by belau at 6:28 PM on July 4, 2012 [1 favorite]
posted by belau at 6:28 PM on July 4, 2012 [1 favorite]
Yeah, I found someone's ATM card (that was also a college university card) and found them on facebook and returned it to them within about an hour after I'd found it.
posted by clone boulevard at 6:28 PM on July 4, 2012 [1 favorite]
posted by clone boulevard at 6:28 PM on July 4, 2012 [1 favorite]
(Facebook was good because the picture on the ID was clearly the same person on facebook. Try there!)
posted by clone boulevard at 6:30 PM on July 4, 2012
posted by clone boulevard at 6:30 PM on July 4, 2012
I was able to do this once by calling their credit card company.
posted by cali at 6:30 PM on July 4, 2012
posted by cali at 6:30 PM on July 4, 2012
Response by poster: Facebook was the first place I looked. It's a common enough name that even trying to filter through people in New York or her home state is not proving helpful. I've been looking through CUNY's site for a student directory, and haven't found one yet. I will call the credit card company. Thanks for the responses!
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 6:32 PM on July 4, 2012
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 6:32 PM on July 4, 2012
Best answer: Yeah this has happened to me before and I called up the credit card company and said "Could you please let them know I have found it, here are my details" (obvs, credit card company won't share customer details to any old joe).
posted by smoke at 6:33 PM on July 4, 2012
posted by smoke at 6:33 PM on July 4, 2012
I had a similar situation with a wallet including student ID. I called university security and explained the situation and asked them to provide me with the person’s phone number and they were very helpful.
posted by TeknoKid at 6:34 PM on July 4, 2012 [2 favorites]
posted by TeknoKid at 6:34 PM on July 4, 2012 [2 favorites]
I would call the college first, and not the credit card company. If you call the credit card, they can mark it up as a "lost" credit card and that can have repercussions for the person. Try to have the college get in contact with the person, if they can or have some method of handling this, and they should.
I would never trust a city lost and found.
posted by caclwmr4 at 6:42 PM on July 4, 2012 [7 favorites]
I would never trust a city lost and found.
posted by caclwmr4 at 6:42 PM on July 4, 2012 [7 favorites]
I have done this recently, with someone I was pretty sure lived in my building. I called the rental place and, rather than ask for her number, left mine -- under the theory that was less intrusive. So you might go the same route with the credit card company or university security
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:46 PM on July 4, 2012 [1 favorite]
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:46 PM on July 4, 2012 [1 favorite]
I was on the receiving end of a similar kindness, and the person who found the wallet called my auto insurance agent who was only too happy to relay the message about where we could pick it up. Being able to play a role in reuniting someone with their lost wallet is something most people wouldn't consider a nuisance.
posted by DrGail at 6:52 PM on July 4, 2012 [2 favorites]
posted by DrGail at 6:52 PM on July 4, 2012 [2 favorites]
I would take it to his bank.
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 6:58 PM on July 4, 2012
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 6:58 PM on July 4, 2012
I lost my wallet recently while travelling, and someone turned it in to a post office. The post office found me somehow, called me, and mailed my wallet back to me. I lost my wallet in Toronto, and the post office managed to find me in Saskatchewan. My phone number wasn't on any of the ID in the wallet. I'm Canada--but I'm pretty sure I've heard of someone turning a wallet in to the post office in the US also. Maybe ask the post office to help you, or if you can't get in touch with the person, they can return it to her.
If there is ID with an address on it, and you just aren't sure if the address is current or not, maybe mail a note with your phone number and ask them to contact you and describe the wallet?
On behalf of wallet-losers everywhere, thank you for your help. Whether you get to hand it back in person or not, it will be appreciated very much.
posted by snorkmaiden at 7:02 PM on July 4, 2012
If there is ID with an address on it, and you just aren't sure if the address is current or not, maybe mail a note with your phone number and ask them to contact you and describe the wallet?
On behalf of wallet-losers everywhere, thank you for your help. Whether you get to hand it back in person or not, it will be appreciated very much.
posted by snorkmaiden at 7:02 PM on July 4, 2012
If the college and credit card options don't pan out, see if there are any sort of membership cards in there. My partner lost his set of keys one time and got them back when the bookshop he had a discount tag for contacted him. Turns out someone had returned the keys to the bookshop, they scanned the tag, found his details.
posted by divabat at 7:25 PM on July 4, 2012
posted by divabat at 7:25 PM on July 4, 2012
The student directory is probably locked to on-campus use or logged in students (I used that exact process earlier this year to return a loose credit card - the location was such that the chance it was a student was very high, and it had a photo of the guy on it.)
What you could do, if you suspect it is a current student, is e-mail the person using the university's e-mail formatting protocol. If it's super common it might be a bust, but it might work. Alternately, try searching for them on official university sites by restricting the search by [name] site:cuny.edu in Google.
But yeah, campus security or any other membership before CC companies, because that's likely to be a total pain if no one's used her cards yet and she has no reason to replace them.
posted by cobaltnine at 7:35 PM on July 4, 2012
What you could do, if you suspect it is a current student, is e-mail the person using the university's e-mail formatting protocol. If it's super common it might be a bust, but it might work. Alternately, try searching for them on official university sites by restricting the search by [name] site:cuny.edu in Google.
But yeah, campus security or any other membership before CC companies, because that's likely to be a total pain if no one's used her cards yet and she has no reason to replace them.
posted by cobaltnine at 7:35 PM on July 4, 2012
If the address is in your area, could you just stop by and ring the bell? That's what some awesome dude did when I lost my wallet a month or so ago - just showed up at our apartment.
posted by youngergirl44 at 8:52 PM on July 4, 2012
posted by youngergirl44 at 8:52 PM on July 4, 2012
If the address is in your area, could you just stop by and ring the bell?
posted by youngergirl44
This seems like a good idea, but I can think of two reasons NOT to do this. First, if you're able to contact the person by phone you can get a sense of them before meeting. Simply showing up on someone's doorstep might lead to an encounter with a real lunatic (its NYC after all - can't be too careful here). Secondly, the address could be in a totally sketchy area - perhaps not somewhere you'd want to be just going up knocking on strangers doors.
An ad on Craigslist wouldn't be a bad idea, I think. Also perhaps there are CUNY Facebook groups where you could ask if anyone knows someone who's lost a wallet.
posted by blaneyphoto at 9:22 PM on July 4, 2012
posted by youngergirl44
This seems like a good idea, but I can think of two reasons NOT to do this. First, if you're able to contact the person by phone you can get a sense of them before meeting. Simply showing up on someone's doorstep might lead to an encounter with a real lunatic (its NYC after all - can't be too careful here). Secondly, the address could be in a totally sketchy area - perhaps not somewhere you'd want to be just going up knocking on strangers doors.
An ad on Craigslist wouldn't be a bad idea, I think. Also perhaps there are CUNY Facebook groups where you could ask if anyone knows someone who's lost a wallet.
posted by blaneyphoto at 9:22 PM on July 4, 2012
Ooh, I wouldn't put an ad out, unless you really do want to meet scam artists and lunatics who will tell you OF COURSE it's their wallet.
Sounds like you have good ideas otherwise, surely the college or the credit card company will be able to help you.
posted by emjaybee at 9:48 PM on July 4, 2012
Sounds like you have good ideas otherwise, surely the college or the credit card company will be able to help you.
posted by emjaybee at 9:48 PM on July 4, 2012
Who makes the ID cards at their school? Where I work, we get students' lost ID's turned in all the time. Call their registrar's office (or at least, that's a good guess as to who is responsible for ID's) and say you found a lost student ID and how would they recommend returning it (and the wallet). We just save the cards/wallets and e-mail the student saying that their ID came in. So that might work for you.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:30 PM on July 4, 2012
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:30 PM on July 4, 2012
Best answer: The security guys at this particular school do not inspire confidence. Ditto the people making the IDs.
In the past I've called a credit card company and given them my phone number to give to the person whose wallet it was. I've also used a gym membership card to reunite someone with their keys - it was a fairly small gym and I think they just gave me the contact info - of course this was just keys and a couple of those tiny cards and not a wallet. The guy was really impressed because he'd gone out for a 10+ mile run and lost the keys on the lanyard about three miles in.
CUNY and CCNY are big (CCNY enrollment is 15k, and total CUNY enrollment is more than a half million) - using any facebook group to try to locate an individual student is not likely to work.
posted by sciencegeek at 3:19 AM on July 5, 2012
In the past I've called a credit card company and given them my phone number to give to the person whose wallet it was. I've also used a gym membership card to reunite someone with their keys - it was a fairly small gym and I think they just gave me the contact info - of course this was just keys and a couple of those tiny cards and not a wallet. The guy was really impressed because he'd gone out for a 10+ mile run and lost the keys on the lanyard about three miles in.
CUNY and CCNY are big (CCNY enrollment is 15k, and total CUNY enrollment is more than a half million) - using any facebook group to try to locate an individual student is not likely to work.
posted by sciencegeek at 3:19 AM on July 5, 2012
Ooh, I wouldn't put an ad out, unless you really do want to meet scam artists and lunatics who will tell you OF COURSE it's their wallet.
posted by emjaybee
Normally that would make sense, except the finder of the wallet has plenty of information to confirm the identity of the true owner without having to actually meet anyone. Posting "Hey, did you lose a wallet in Manhattan (or wherever)? If so, email/call me with your info" would be enough.
It would then be simple for the finder to check the Name, first of all - and types of credit cards in the wallet, other ID, etc against whatever info the person provides. It'd be easy to figure out who was the owner without having to interact with them directly until the correct person is found.
posted by blaneyphoto at 6:08 AM on July 5, 2012
posted by emjaybee
Normally that would make sense, except the finder of the wallet has plenty of information to confirm the identity of the true owner without having to actually meet anyone. Posting "Hey, did you lose a wallet in Manhattan (or wherever)? If so, email/call me with your info" would be enough.
It would then be simple for the finder to check the Name, first of all - and types of credit cards in the wallet, other ID, etc against whatever info the person provides. It'd be easy to figure out who was the owner without having to interact with them directly until the correct person is found.
posted by blaneyphoto at 6:08 AM on July 5, 2012
The other issue with "just showing up and knocking" is that if this person is a student it's totally likely that their address info is out-of-date.
Do you know someone else with a school email address for that school? Do they follow any sort of pattern? You could try that.
posted by AmandaA at 6:29 AM on July 5, 2012
Do you know someone else with a school email address for that school? Do they follow any sort of pattern? You could try that.
posted by AmandaA at 6:29 AM on July 5, 2012
Posting "Hey, did you lose a wallet in Manhattan (or wherever)? If so, email/call me with your info" would be enough.
But you'd have to answer tons of bogus calls/emails. Sounds like a giant PITA. I vote for contacting the school.
posted by desjardins at 6:44 AM on July 5, 2012
But you'd have to answer tons of bogus calls/emails. Sounds like a giant PITA. I vote for contacting the school.
posted by desjardins at 6:44 AM on July 5, 2012
Sounds like a giant PITA. I vote for contacting the school.
posted by desjardins
Guess it depends on how bad the finder wants to locate the owner. But it really could be pretty simple - set up a throwaway email and check it once a week. Pretty easy to delete emails. Maybe this seems like nothing to me because I hold casting calls regularly and field and absurd amount of email and phone inquiries. All in all, its not a big effort though.
Also, its not like the finder can ONLY do one thing - contact the school, sure. Why not try a bunch of things?
posted by blaneyphoto at 6:53 AM on July 5, 2012
posted by desjardins
Guess it depends on how bad the finder wants to locate the owner. But it really could be pretty simple - set up a throwaway email and check it once a week. Pretty easy to delete emails. Maybe this seems like nothing to me because I hold casting calls regularly and field and absurd amount of email and phone inquiries. All in all, its not a big effort though.
Also, its not like the finder can ONLY do one thing - contact the school, sure. Why not try a bunch of things?
posted by blaneyphoto at 6:53 AM on July 5, 2012
Also, an alternative might be to see if the person who lost the wallet posts on CL. Seems like there have been a few recently.
posted by blaneyphoto at 7:00 AM on July 5, 2012
posted by blaneyphoto at 7:00 AM on July 5, 2012
After losing my wallet, I got it in the mail a few weeks later.
I recommend taking it to the post office or dropping it in a postal mailbox.
posted by jcatus at 7:31 AM on July 5, 2012 [1 favorite]
I recommend taking it to the post office or dropping it in a postal mailbox.
posted by jcatus at 7:31 AM on July 5, 2012 [1 favorite]
Best answer: I once found a set of keys that had an ExxonMobil Speedpass attached to it. I contacted the company, gave them my contact information, and they contacted the owner, who then contacted me. She came by my office and I returned the keys to her. Very easy.
So: Nthing all the people who have suggested you contact one of the third parties "in" the wallet.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 9:17 AM on July 5, 2012
So: Nthing all the people who have suggested you contact one of the third parties "in" the wallet.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 9:17 AM on July 5, 2012
I've memailed the OP the wallet owner's email. A friend has access to CCNY's email directory. So here's hoping.
posted by sciencegeek at 9:35 AM on July 5, 2012
posted by sciencegeek at 9:35 AM on July 5, 2012
Response by poster: Thank you, everybody, for the responses, both here and to my MeFi mail. I've emailed her and will let you know what happens. This is why I love Metafilter!
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 9:52 AM on July 5, 2012
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 9:52 AM on July 5, 2012
Response by poster: I just handed off the wallet to its very grateful owner. Her credit card company had called her today to let her know I had contacted them and gave her my phone number. She lives around the corner, and was able to meet me at my apartment. I think I can safely hoist the Mission Accomplished banner. Thank you, all!
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 5:22 PM on July 5, 2012 [8 favorites]
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 5:22 PM on July 5, 2012 [8 favorites]
Well done! Glad it wound up back with its rightful owner.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 10:53 PM on July 5, 2012
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 10:53 PM on July 5, 2012
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by rtha at 6:26 PM on July 4, 2012