At one point or another, we’ve all experienced it. You know, that crushing anxiety of misplacing your wallet and not remembering where it went. Very few feelings compare to the dread of looking and looking for your wallet and not being able to find it.

Hopefully you’re not here because you’re currently scrambling your own lost wallet! But if you are, or you’re wanting to learn how to prevent losing your wallet again in the future, this guide will give you some tips on how to ensure that your wallet gets back to you as soon as possible. 

We’ll also cover a couple ideas on how to prevent losing your wallet in the first place. And if the worse comes to be and your wallet is gone forever, we’ll give you some tips on the next right steps to take from there. Let’s get started.

1) Stay Calm

When you first realize that your wallet is missing, it’s easy to get worked up. We all carry very important things inside our wallets which are necessary to interact with the modern world. Cash, credit/debit cards, driver’s license, insurance, the list goes on and on! But you have to remember to stay calm.

The reason why staying calm is the best thing to do when you realize you can’t find your wallet is because it’s going to keep your head clear. This will allow you to make much more rational decisions, which is key to ensuring that you’ll increase the odds of recovering your wallet.

Staying calm in this sort of situation is easier said than done though. When you start to feel the anxiety pouring in, try the following steps to help keep those negative feelings at bay:

• Close your eyes
• Take some deep breaths
• If you have a fidget nearby, pick that up and interact with it
• Enlist the help of someone nearby so you feel less alone

Each of these things will ultimately help keep your heart rate lower, which in turn will help you stay calm and will increase the chances that you find your wallet.

2) Retrace Your Steps

The first question that you often get asked when you tell someone you lost your wallet is “where did you last have it?” If you remembered to do the first step and stay calm, you’ll be able to readily answer this pretty obvious question with a courteous “I don’t remember” rather than with the sarcastic “If I remembered, I wouldn’t be looking for it!” 

The “where did you last have it question” while somewhat annoying in the moment is the best reminder to literally go back to where you were during your day to look for your wallet. Think to times that you were really busy during your day. Where did you go? What were you doing? Oftentimes when we are really busy, it’s easy to get distracted and make a silly mistake by placing your wallet down somewhere you don’t normally put it. By thinking back to the busiest times of your day, it could lead you to finding your wallet!

Another place to consider when thinking about where you were for the day is the times when you actually used your wallet. Think about places you pulled it out to pay for something. Could you have possibly left it at the restaurant or gas station? Maybe it fell out of your pocket after getting gas and it’s just sitting inside of your vehicle. 

Retracing your steps from the day will hopefully give you some insights into places to look for your lost wallet and lead to its recovery.

3) What was in Your Wallet?

If you’ve looked everywhere you could think of and still can’t find your wallet, it’s time to start making a list of everything that was in your wallet. Think about the credit cards you had, your driver’s license, health insurance, and any other important document you carried in it. 

The reason why you want to have a list of all the things you had in your wallet is that you need to be prepared to deal with the consequences of losing these things. One of the worst things that can happen is someone getting ahold of your important documents and using them against you. Having a list of everything in your wallet will ensure that you don’t give those that would seek to take advantage of your misfortunes the opportunity to do so.

4) Contact Your Card Issuers

If you haven’t found your wallet after 24 hours, it’s time to start calling your credit card and debit card companies. They have the ability to turn off your cards so that anyone who might try to use them for fraudulent purchases can’t do so. 

You can easily do this by either logging into your card issuer’s website and finding the help tab. From there, many card companies have the option to set a block on your card, without fully deactivating it. That way, you can buy yourself a bit more time to look in case you haven’t finished retracing all of your steps to when you last had your wallet.

But if it’s been a couple of days and you haven’t found your wallet, it’s probably best to deactivate your cards and get new ones issued. It might be a pain in the butt to have to reset all of your autopay features on your various accounts, but getting your credit ruined by bad actors is much worse in the long run.

5) File a Police Report

Now, all of what we’ve talked about goes right out the window if you suspect someone has stolen your wallet. If you left it in your vehicle and come back to find broken glass and a missing wallet, immediately contact the police, and shut down your cards as quickly as possible. 

If you do end up noticing that someone used your cards to fraudulently buy something, make sure to get in contact with your credit card company to let them know that it was a fraudulent charge. Most credit card companies have policies on what to do if your card is stolen and used by the thief. The most common thing that happens is that you get your money refunded, so long as you report it quickly.

6) Work Towards Replacing Your Cards

If you’re certain that your wallet is never coming back, it’s time to start getting your business back in order. Remember that list you made earlier? Now is the time to look at it again to start making appointments to replace your lost documents and cards.

One of the most important things to replace as soon as possible is your driver’s license. Contact your state’s DMV to get all of the information that you need to quickly replace your license. 

Also remember to activate your replacement credit cards and debit cards by calling the number listed on the cards. That way you’ll be able to start using your cards again as soon as they’re issued to you.

7) Buy a New Wallet

Buying a new wallet after losing one is a pretty somber undertaking. You feel defeated that you couldn’t find your original one. Keep your head up though! Buying a new wallet is an opportunity to ensure that this sort of thing never happens again, especially when you know where to find the best wallet that you’ll never lose again.

 An Ounce of Prevention is Worth a Pound of Cure

We’ve talked a lot about how to react to losing your wallet. But the most important step in finding a lost wallet is to prevent it from happening in the first place. How do you do that? By picking up an Axwell Wallet. 

Axwell wallets are the pinnacle of modern wallets because they can be outfitted with GPS tracking to help you find your wallet. The Chipolo x Axwell Tracker Bundle is the perfect way to prevent losing your wallet ever again. 

What is the Chipolo x Axwell Tracker Bundle? It’s the thing that is going to keep you from having to go through the pain of replacing all of your cards! The GPS tracker looks like just a normal credit card that you can keep inside of your wallet at all times. In the Chipolo app, you can pair your tracker to your phone so that you know exactly where it is at all times, giving you peace of mind that you’ll never lose your wallet again! 

In addition to the Chipolo x Axwell Tracker Bundle, each Axwell wallet is built with RFID blocking plates to prevent would be thieves from stealing your credit card information a touchless chip reader. This is critical to protecting your important information, because most credit card companies are going to tap-to-pay cards. While this is convenient, it’s also a risk because all a thief needs is a card reader and some proximity to you to steal your info. With the RFID blocking plates, your info will remain safe no matter what technology thieves bring to the table.

So save yourself the headache. Help prevent losing your wallet again by upgrading to the Axwell Wallet with the Chipolo Tracking Card.

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