Yep, all he needed to do was write down the 12 or 16 words on a piece of paper.
I spent months in the hospital and rehab after a SCI; had to close my business while recuperating over the following year. My 14 BTC ($400 cost each) were in a Coinbase account, but were tied to my company’s email domain, which expired unknown to me. They were irretrievable. When I started to see BTC going nuts, I tried to access my account to no avail. Coinbase’s FAQ’s and CSR’s were no help at all, try after try after try. I was freaking out!
In a last move of desperation, I wrote a personal letter to the CEO of Coinbase at their San Francisco office marked “Personal & Confidential”, detailing my dilemma.
4 days later, I got a personal call from him, giving me a new login/password for the account! In-effin’-credible!
Long post short, I finally cashed out when BTC was in the vicinity of $20k. Sure, I coulda held on, but what the heck.... a profit is a profit, and I put it to good use renovating my home to be wheelchair friendly. A $.50 stamp and a politely-worded letter paid massive dividends.