Finance
From mobile phones to cooked frogs, inside London's biggest lost property office
Published by Global Banking and Finance Review
Posted on November 29, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 20, 2026
Global Banking and Finance Review
Company
Published by Global Banking and Finance Review
Posted on November 29, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 20, 2026
Transport for London's warehouse, Europe's largest, handles 6,000 lost items weekly, from phones to cooked frogs. Most items are unclaimed and later auctioned or donated.
By Vitalii Yalahuzian and Marissa Davison
LONDON, Nov 29 (Reuters) - Mobile phones, wallets, rucksacks, spectacles and keys top the list of the 6,000 items that arrive weekly at Transport for London's lost property warehouse, alongside some unexpected items, including a bag of cooked frogs and an urn of ashes.
"We didn't keep them," Transport for London manager Diana Quaye said of the frogs.
A sandwich left on London Underground's Victoria line, or a chocolate bar on the top deck of the Number 37 bus, gets chucked away with the frogs and all other perishable items. But everything else is sorted, logged, labelled and filed away in Transport for London's east London warehouse.
BIGGEST LOST PROPERTY OFFICE IN EUROPE
Slightly smaller than a football pitch, the warehouse, packed full of rows of sliding shelves, is the biggest lost property office in Europe and has a staff of 45, Transport for London says.
Umbrella handles protrude from one shelf, books overflow from another, while hundreds of stuffed children's toys, including a huge St Bernard dog teddy and a Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer, sit forlornly, awaiting collection.
One area is dedicated to intriguing finds from over the decades. There's a wedding dress, an artificial limb and a taxidermy fox, amongst other treasures which would delight flea-market enthusiasts.
Under one-fifth of all items lost on London's tubes, overground trains, buses and black cabs are ever reclaimed. After typically holding items for three months, Transport for London decides whether to auction them or send them to charity.
They give sports equipment to a local school, while new toys are given to a children's charity at Christmas.
The urn of ashes, held in a bag that was then stolen, was kept by Transport for London for seven years before eventually being returned to its owner in Germany.
Commuters on buses are the biggest culprits when it comes to lost property, Quaye said.
"I don't know if people get a bit relaxed on the bus, but they tend to leave items on there," she said.
(Reporting by Vitalii Yalahuzian and Marissa Davison; Writing by Sarah Young; Editing by Conor Humphries)
Lost property refers to items that have been misplaced or forgotten by their owners in public places, such as transport systems, and are collected for safekeeping.
A lost property office is a designated location where lost items are stored, logged, and managed until they are reclaimed by their owners or disposed of.
Common items found in lost property include mobile phones, wallets, keys, and bags, along with more unusual items like clothing and personal belongings.
To reclaim lost property, individuals usually need to report the loss, provide identification, and describe the item to the lost property office.
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