FS Form 1048: Replacing or Cashing Lost, Stolen or Destroyed Bonds

FS Form 1048 is the claim you file with Treasury when a paper savings bond has been lost, stolen or destroyed, and it lets you ask for one of two outcomes: a replacement or a payment. For Series EE and Series I bonds the replacement is no longer a paper certificate. Treasury issues it as an electronic bond inside a TreasuryDirect account, which means the claim cannot be finished without one.

What the form does

The instructions give the purpose in one line: “Use this form to apply for relief on account of the loss, theft, or destruction of United States Savings Bonds.” The word “bonds” on the form covers more than the familiar EE and I series. The instructions say it refers to “Savings Bonds, Savings Notes, Retirement Plan Bonds, or Individual Retirement Bonds.” TreasuryDirect’s help page for EE and I bonds adds that the same route applies when a bond is mutilated or you never received it.

The form is a petition, not a simple request. In the signature section you acknowledge that, if relief is granted, the original securities become the property of the United States, and you assign your rights in them to the government. You also bind yourself to surrender the originals “should they come into my/our possession,” to hold the United States harmless against claims from other people with an interest in the bonds, and to repay Treasury on demand if it pays out because of a redemption of the originals. You sign all of this under penalty of perjury, in front of a notary or certifying officer.

Replacement or cash

Item 5 asks you to indicate whether you want substitute bonds or payment, and the form offers a third choice for people who owe a savings bond debt to the Treasury. How much choice you really have depends on the series and the age of the bond. The table pulls together the limits the form and TreasuryDirect’s help pages state.

Two details are worth pausing on. First, payment on this form is always by direct deposit. Section 6B asks for the payee’s Social Security number or Employer Identification Number, the name on the account, the bank routing number, the account number and the type of account, so you need a bank account to receive it. Second, the TreasuryDirect page for HH bonds explains the reason there is no replacement: redemption is the only option “as they have ceased to earn interest and have matured.” A page about non-administered estates elsewhere on the site still says replacement HH bonds are on paper, which contradicts both the form and the HH page. The form is the current document and says HH bonds can no longer be reissued, so rely on it.

If you take the electronic replacement, Section 6A asks for the TreasuryDirect account number, the account name and the Social Security number or Employer Identification Number on the account. The form notes that you may add a secondary owner or beneficiary after the bonds are replaced, from inside the account. If you do not yet have an account, TreasuryDirect says you need to open one. Since October 28, 2026, ID.me is the only way to log in to TreasuryDirect, according to TreasuryDirect’s own FAQ, which does not separately describe opening a brand-new account, so a question about that case belongs with Customer Support. Our guide to TreasuryDirect without ID.me lays out what the FAQ does and does not say.

Describing a bond you no longer have

Item 1 is the description of the bonds. It asks for the issue date (“Exact date or a range of dates”), the face amount, the bond serial number and the inscription, which means the complete Social Security number, the names with any middle names or initials, and the addresses on the bonds. If the bond was a gift, you give the purchaser’s Social Security number. For more room you can attach a list or FS Form 3500. The instructions are blunt about the main identifier: “Describe the missing bonds by bond serial number.”

What the form does not do is tell you what to do when you have no serial numbers. It is silent on the point. Two other sources fill part of the gap, and both come with a caveat.

FS Publication 0107, “Filing a Claim for Lost, Stolen, or Destroyed United States Savings Bonds & Notes” (revised August 2022), says Treasury needs the serial number “before searching for the record of your bond.” If you do not have it, the publication says to provide all of the following: the specific month and year of purchase, the complete Social Security number, the names including middle names or initials, and the address (street, city, state). That publication is older than the March 2026 form, so treat it as guidance rather than a current rule.

The TreasuryDirect page for HH bonds goes further and splits the answer by issue date. If the bond was issued before 1974, use the form even without serial numbers. If it was issued in 1974 or after, the page sends you to Treasury Hunt, which it says would produce “a special version of FS Form 1048” with a reference number. The trouble is that the Treasury Hunt page now reads: “As of September 30, 2025, the Treasury Hunt® tool is no longer available.” It points to the forms page for how to submit a claim. I could not confirm from any source whether the special serial-free version is still issued, so a person with no serial numbers and a bond from 1974 or later should ask TreasuryDirect Customer Support (844-284-2676) before mailing anything. The page for EE and I bonds says nothing about serial numbers at all.

TreasuryDirect’s forms page also lists FS Form 2243, a supplemental statement that it describes as support for a claim made on FS Form 1048.

The account of the loss

Item 2 is a short narrative, and the form wants it complete. You mark whether the bonds were lost, stolen or destroyed. For theft you give the date; for destruction you send any remaining pieces with the form, and Publication 0107 says to pack mutilated pieces carefully. You say whether a police report was filed and attach a copy if so. Then come five questions: when the loss was discovered, who had the bonds last and why, where they were last placed, when they were last seen, and whether any identification documents were also lost or stolen (and which).

The instructions add one rule for larger claims. If the bonds involved exceed $5,000 and a law enforcement agency or an insurance, transportation or similar business organization investigated, you provide a copy of the report. If you live in a declared disaster area, the instructions say you complete only parts 1, 5, 6B and 7, write the word “DISASTER” at the top of the first page, and write it on the front of the envelope.

Who has to sign

The instructions say the form “must be completed and signed by all persons named on the bonds, or by an authorized representative.” Item 3 asks whether you are named on the bonds. If you are not, you describe your authority, and the form’s own examples are parent, guardian, conservator, legal representative, administrator and executor.

A court-appointed representative has a specific evidence requirement. If you were appointed because the owner is deceased with no surviving coowner or beneficiary named, or because the owner or coowner is a minor or is incapacitated, the instructions require a court certificate or a certified copy of your letters of appointment, “under court seal and dated within one year of submission,” showing the appointment is still in force. If your name and official capacity already appear in the bond’s registration, you do not need that evidence. If no legal representative has been appointed for a deceased or incompetent owner, the instructions say to advise the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, which will provide further instructions.

When a registrant has died, you submit a certified copy of the official death certificate. A short summary of who needs what:

Item 4 deals with minors in detail. A minor with no court-appointed guardian who is requesting payment, or who is named on Series HH bonds, may sign alone if the notary or certifying officer thinks the minor is competent enough to understand the transaction. If the minor is not competent enough to sign alone, or is requesting electronic substitute EE or I bonds, the parent or parents with whom the minor lives complete Item 4. If the minor lives with neither parent, the person who provides the minor’s chief support completes and signs it. The item asks for the minor’s name, date of birth and Social Security number, your relationship, where the minor lives and who supports the minor, and, if both parents cannot sign, why one cannot and whether that parent had access to or could have possessed the bonds.

Certifying the signatures

The signature block reads: “Sign in ink in the presence of a notary or certifying officer and provide the requested information.” Every person whose signature is required has to appear before the notary or officer and establish identification to that person’s satisfaction, and sign in front of them. The instructions say authorized certifying officers “are available at financial institutions, including credit unions, in the United States.”

Acceptable seals include a notary’s seal or stamp; a financial institution’s official seal or stamp, such as a Signature Guaranteed, Endorsement Guaranteed, corporate, or issuing or paying agent stamp; and the stamp of a Treasury-recognized Signature Guarantee Program or other Treasury-approved Medallion Program. The officer must fill in the names of those who appeared and the date, and an original signature is required if a Medallion stamp is used.

Not every Treasury page describes it this way. TreasuryDirect’s forms page repeats that this form is signed “in the presence of a notary or a certifying individual,” but Publication 0107 mentions only an authorized certifying officer at a bank, trust company or credit union. The current form allows a notary, and the stricter wording of the older publication still accepts a bank officer, so a certifying officer is the choice that satisfies all of them. Our table of TreasuryDirect forms by notary or certifying officer compares the rule across forms.

Mailing it and what follows

Send the form and any additional information to Treasury Retail Securities Services, P.O. Box 9150, Minneapolis, MN 55480-9150. The instructions warn that legal evidence or documentation “cannot be returned.” The form estimates about 20 minutes to complete and says nothing about how long Treasury takes to act, so there is no date to count on. The Parkersburg, West Virginia address printed at the end of the form is only for comments on the form.

If the bond turns up after Treasury has replaced or paid it, it no longer belongs to you. TreasuryDirect’s instruction is to send it back to the same Minneapolis address.

Taxes and next steps

The form has one tax notice, in Section 6A, and it only concerns electronic substitutes. If the name of a living owner or principal coowner is dropped from the registration, that person “must include the interest earned and previously unreported on the bonds to the date of the transaction” on the federal return for the year of the reissue, and the form states that the obligation to report the interest cannot be transferred to someone else through a reissue. For tax questions it points you to the IRS. The form’s tax notice says nothing about payment.

Once the original bond has been replaced, any later change to the registration runs through other forms. FS Form 4000 covers reissue of paper bonds, and our guide to FS Form 1522 covers the form TreasuryDirect lists for requesting payment on paper securities.

Sources

• FS Form 1048, Claim for Lost, Stolen, or Destroyed United States Savings Bonds (rev. March 2026), including its instructions: https://www.treasurydirect.gov/forms/sav1048.pdf
• TreasuryDirect, Get help for lost, stolen, or destroyed EE or I savings bond: https://www.treasurydirect.gov/savings-bonds/manage-bonds/lost-stolen-destroyed-ee-or-i-bonds/
• TreasuryDirect, Get help for lost, stolen, or destroyed HH savings bond: https://www.treasurydirect.gov/savings-bonds/manage-bonds/lost-stolen-destroyed-hh-bonds/
• TreasuryDirect, Treasury Hunt (tool discontinued September 30, 2025): https://www.treasurydirect.gov/savings-bonds/treasury-hunt/
• TreasuryDirect, Forms for Savings Bonds: https://www.treasurydirect.gov/savings-bonds/forms/
• TreasuryDirect, Non-administered estates: https://www.treasurydirect.gov/savings-bonds/manage-bonds/death-of-owner/non-administered-estates/
• FS Publication 0107, Filing a Claim for Lost, Stolen, or Destroyed United States Savings Bonds & Notes (rev. August 2022): https://www.treasurydirect.gov/forms/sav0107.pdf
• TreasuryDirect, FAQs about ID.me, read November 2, 2026: https://www.treasurydirect.gov/savings-bonds/help-center/faqs/idme-faq/