Mum's house - Can we keep the utilities ongoing?

[CashewNut11]

My lovely mum passed away suddenly but peacefully recently. My bro and I, her executors, live a distance away and would like to stay in the house when we visit to sort out her things - archiving photos, letters and the like.

We're currently waiting for mum to be released by the coroner after the post mortem. This is taking a while, longer than we were led to believe.

What do we do about her bank account and the utility direct debits? We don't really want the house to be without utilities (whether we're there or not), but if the bank freezes the account does this mean all direct debits need to be stopped?

There is probably enough in the account to pay for the funeral and utility bills for approx 6 months plus.

She has other accounts in that bank, (and others... !) So, could we keep the account open and transfer a safety net of money to the account?

Apologies if this has been dealt with here many times before. Please post links to previous threads if so (I did search...)

I would've thought this must happen a lot but can't find anything specific about it online.

Thanks!

Hi Cashew, very sorry for your sudden loss and sorry I can't help.

I think your thread is in Active Convos because you only just posted and that's where I saw it. It will probably drop out of that by morning so you might get more answers if you ask MNHQ to move it to Chat tomorrow.

I hope you get it all sorted

When my husband died they froze his accounts. Unfortunately our mortgage and bills came out of it. I contacted each supplier and they have a process - the mortgage company gave me three months break for example. This is obviously a common occurrence and each utility will put you through to their deceased client department.
You must tell the banks she is deceased. If you are executor and have a copy of the Will you may get them to transfer the money out without waiting for probate. Just being her daughter isn't enough - the executor must do it. Then open an account specifically to deal with things associated with the house (you can call it 'her name estate'. This will keep it all transparent in terms of probate, taxes and so on. Expenses associated with dealing with her estate can come out of this account.
I found having to deal with the practical things helped keep me going.

Inform everyone of the death. Her bank account will be frozen and utilities continue but to be settled after probate or house sale. All dd will stop automatically. You can not transfer money out of a dead person's bank account unless it is a joint account. The funeral director can send the funeral bill directly to the bank which can be paid. Nothing else can be paid until probate or letters of authorisation are shown to the bank etc.
You notify everyone of her desth, gather all assets in and then settle all bills.If there is a house to sell utilities will wait for their money until the house is sold. Community charge will start 6 months after probate. You will need insurance on the empty house or still have rent to pay if it is rented accomodation.

Thank you all for your comments and condolences.

My brother and I are the named executors in mum's will. We have her copy from the solicitors (she told me where she'd put it years ago), but we are also requesting it from the solicitors.

With no death certificate we're limited as to what we can do at the moment. We hope to collect the will from the solicitors' today (or Mon).

So, from what's been posted, to keep the house running, we need to open an account in her name, no problem there, but would we then need to create new direct debits for house insurance and other utilities? Can they be transferred?

Thanks again all! I just feel like I'm walking through treacle.

Just inform the utilities of her death and explain the bank account is frozen.
FiL died last year, we had the phone/internet cut off, the water company sent us a final bill as he was on a meter ( I had to email the death cert though) and said that as the house was empty, there would be no charges and to contact them when the house is sold.

His Gas / electric is B. Gas - my SiL transferred the account into her name ( or set up new account) .
They all have bereavement departments so it’s very straightforward.
You will need empty house insurance, it’s perhaps double normal insurance rates. We’ve just got buildings as the house is empty. You have to keep the heating on at above 12 degrees and check the property regularly.

We couldn’t keep the house insurance going and had to go to a specialist company, we used Orwell insurance. Every ‘normal’ insurance company I tried wouldn’t cover an empty house, despite us living very close by.

Council tax stops for 6 months.
You will need the death certificate, the registrar did everything over the phone with DH because of lockdown and we got 6 copies. They informed all the Governent depts. Pension/NHS/DVLA etc.
If she had a private pension you have to send an actual copy of the Death cert. From memory all the utilities and Barclays accepted scanned ones.

Hopefully all her affairs are straightforward and applying for probate, although time consuming, was relatively easy, but then FiL was under the IHT limit and only had one Bank acc.

Thank you GenderApostate19!

This helps so much. It's good to know there are paths through this.

Im sure part of this need to keep the house going is grief, wanting to preserve and conserve as much of her life as possible until we're ready to let it go...

A practical concern about the house insurance is that it has had a 'shifting' issue which is noted on the current policy. My bro feels we could lose that 'continuity' and acknowledgement of the issue if the policy just stops.

We don't know if she falls under the IHT. My bro seems to think my deceased Dad's limit is added to hers (he passed in 2000).

Thank you again!

You can't open anything in a dead person's name. The utilities remain in her name until paid. Any insurance will be in your name. The house, car et c insurance stops on her death and can not be transferred

The IHT limits are added together, minus any bequests your dad made.

(assuming they were married, to each other)

The bereavement departments at the utility companies are very helpful. When you notify the bank of your mums passing, they will freeze the accounts, though you can apply to have funeral costs paid for out of them. But the utility companies will keep the accounts running and just send you a bill every so often, but I was told that until I said that the house was sold they didn't need paying.
The insurance I had to notify that the house was empty, and it changed the terms slightly and though they normally have a limit on it being empty, this was waived due to covid.
As long as your dad left everything to your mum, and your mum left everything to you and your brother, there is a transfer of IHT allowance from your dad as well as a property disregard transfer from your dad to your mum and your mum to you. This meant my parents estate was IHT free (they both died last year), and I did probate and IHT submission myself.
If the house is some distance away, you might find it easier to rent a storage unit close to you and move things to there rather than having to arrange to both be there esp with the uncertainties. It has been much easier for me to firstly move everything of any value to there, sort it (in the peace and quiet of the unit) , and then move more in of the letter/photo type thing

Moneysaving expert forums are an invaluable source of information.
They have a dedicated Deaths, Funerals and Probate section under the Families heading.
The Gov.uk site is also very helpful.
You should be able to use your Dad’s nil rate allowance against IHT.

Unless there are valuable antiques/Jewellery etc. Whole house contents can be calued at £500. DFiL had a couple of classic cars we had to declare on the forms and the cash in his Bank acc. We just used Zoopla as a guide to the house value.

When you get the death certificate you'll probably get a form that tells you about the 'tell us once' service too. Using the certificate code you can notify DVLA, council tax, state pension etc people in one form. It's an excellent service.

I found it difficult calling all the utilities in one go but they were all excellent.
Patient and sympathetic.

Don’t underestimate the time it could take.
We are just at the point of hopefully exchanging contracts on his house, so to wind up his estate has taken since mid-July. Everything bar the house was done by September.
If they were in the house for a long time - check the land Registry, it costs £3 to do online. We had a VERY nasty surprise in that the house wasn’t registered! It took us till September to locate the Deeds, they had been there since 1970, house paid off early 90’s, before it was mandatory to register property.
It was a hugely stressful time and only a chance conversation let us know where the deeds were, even then Barclays were awful, firstly denying they had them, then I managed to find a letter from 1997 about deed storage, then it took them weeks to find them!

Sorry for your loss OP. When my DF passed away I had the direct debits transferred to my own bank account, I contacted the relevant companies and made the switch.

Ask the coroner for a 'Coroner's Certificate of the Fact of Death'. Make sure you get at least 5 copies.

I think they will only issue after a post mortem though. It is an interim death certificate until the inquest can be held.

I am sorry for your loss, I was in a similar situation last month with a relative being held by the coroner, it is a very difficult time.

In the meantime ring the banks and utility companies - I found them very helpful.

Hi everyone!

Thank you all for your comments and leads on this.

We have finally had notice of the result of the post mortem and now have the coroner and the funeral directors processing paperwork. I think mum will be released early next week (and I'm hoping then to visit the Chapel of Rest the following w/e).

I can use Mon to start contacting utilities and banks, but may not have death certs until Wed-Thurs.

Thanks again. Your comments have been really helpful. Much appreciated

Many (not all) banks will release some of the funds so you can deal with immediate expenses. My sister and I were joint execs and set up a joint account and NatWest released £5k from her current account so we could pay funeral expenses and transfer utilities there. Get more than one death certificate - you have to pay I think £4 for them but it means you can send a bunch to different providers and banks all at the same time rather than wait and do it in sequence.

I’m really sorry for your loss. The best advice we got when mum died was to get at least 10 copies of the death certificate - some companies will send them back but others won’t so it’s good to have plenty to avoid delays.

Oh and yes to Tell Us Once. Made things much easier.

When my df passed away the tell us once service was invaluable. We also had a couple of death certificates so if we needed to send any off, we had another to send or scan.
So sorry for your loss

So sorry for your loss. My mum died just over a year ago and we kept the house going until it was eventually sold 9 months later (COVID happening delayed us for some time). My siblings and I were joint executors but I dealt with the admin and my name was on the death certificate as having reported it. Others have mentioned good advice regarding the bereavement teams at the utility companies and bank / building societies plus getting at least 3 death certificates. Further to that, I was able to keep the existing home insurance subject to monthly visits to the property (all discussed with the insurance company and waived during the first lock down). We were lucky that there were wonderful neighbours who kept an eye on the property too as we lived 50+ miles away. For utilities the bills then came to me (but marked as for the estate of my mum) and I paid on receipt rather than by DD. I was able to close the bank account and have the balance transferred to me; I used a spare account I had to keep the estate funds separate from my own money, but it was in my name rather than an estate name. As it was a larger estate I had to complete a tax return, which was then approved, and pay an instalment of tax before Probate could be issued. I was able to use my father's inheritance tax allowance though (he had died 6 years beforehand) plus there is now an extra allowance if family are inheriting the house (even if is then sold as the inheritance is split between children).