Please can you talk me through dealing with a death - the practical stuff

[pastypirate]

Dm died this morning. It was horrendous but what I need advice about is that I will be sole executor I think - only child and dm exh is long dead.

Body waiting to be released from mortuary and they said expect that in a week or so.

I've locked up the house and turned the boiler right down.

I know I need to choose a funeral home and that's all...

What else do I do? I'm in total shock.

I'm sorry for your loss. There is good step by step advice on the government website about what you need to do.

https://www.gov.uk/when-someone-dies

Try not to be overwhelmed. Just think about one thing at a time.

I was about to post the same link - print off a checklist and let it guide you through the steps on autopilot.

I'm sorry for your loss; it sounds like it was a shock, on top of the grief. Take a moment to get your head together. There's very little that needs to be dealt with in the next ten minutes.

So sorry for your loss. Try to look after yourself, it's physically shocking as well as emotionally shocking.
Eat little meals and try to get outside for 20 minutes a day.

Do you have anyone to help you?

Thanks. I'm not without help dp is here but when his mum died he had 4 siblings to share the load.

So sorry for your loss. You have plenty of time to sort everything out. I found it helpful to have all my notes for what needed to be done on one notepad and had a reference bit for national insurance number etc. I remember using the tell us once service. If you need to speak to someone on the phone, most banks have a special bereavement team and will treat you very compassionately. I sorted probate out myself as I am an only child and it was simple but there is no hurry. I think I tried to do one small job a day to keep from feeling overwhelmed.

I’m so sorry for your loss.

Practically speaking, did your DM leave any requests for her funeral?

You can use the “Tell Us Once” service for all things government so that will include council tax, DVLA, State pension etc

Outside of that, there’s the utility companies, Royal Mail, and if she got milk delivered you’ll need to stop it.

I d it don't know you could do probate yourself.

We owned a property in common and have joint bills. It will be down to me to decide what to do with two properties now. It's the mental load that's already draining me.

I'm waiting for the dds to get home to tell them.

I'm sorry for your loss.

My Dad died at the end of August so my Mum, my brother and I are still dealing with practical matters.

Once you feel able to, and when you know that the doctor has sent the medical form through with the cause of death, the first thing to do is to register the death, as you can't do much else without a death certificate. I rang the Register Office to see if I had to make an appointment and to my surprise I was able to do the whole thing over the phone immediately. This may be unusual, though.

Whether you do it face to face or over the phone, you need to have a lot of documentation to hand as there will be quite a few questions to answer. The links given above probably give a list. From memory, we needed my Dad's birth certificate for information on that about his parents, which I hadn't expected to have to provide. I think we may also have needed my parents' marriage certificate.

The Registrar asked us if we wanted to use the Tell Us Once service and when we said yes she did it immediately for us as part of the samel call. This is a really useful service available in England, Wales and Scotland. I believe NI has an equivalent service. Once the death is registered, this service automatically passes the details onto HMRC, the Department of Work and Pensions, the NHS, the DVLA, the local council and probably various other government and similar departments. That saves you a lot of letters and calls, and it all worked very smoothly for us.

It's a good idea to ask for at least one copy of the death certificate as you may have to send it off. There will be a small charge for that.

Once the death is registered, you can arrange the funeral. You should also notify your Mum's banks, pension providers (DWP will already be notified, see above) and any insurance companies. My parents' bank has a bereavement team who dealt with everything (again, over the phone, but in their branch, so that the staff there could verify ID first).

You should notify whoever is insuring the house and contents as soon as possible that the house is now empty so that cover isn't affected.

I hope this helps. It all seems overwhelming at a time when there is so much to process emotionally. It must be much worse if the death was sudden and unexpected. (My Dad's wasn't, really, as he was very elderly and in hospital.)

Very best wishes for the next few weeks.

I've just been through this with FIL.

If your DM died in hospital they will send the details to the Registrar, who will then advise you that you can come in and register the death. TO do this you will need to dig out her birth certificate and, if you can find it, her marriage certificate.

I found the Registrar really helpful. We were supplied with a load of contact emails and links. The Tell us once service was quick and easy to use. It was picked up by HMRC and MIL had a tax refund within a couple of months which was a complete surprise.

The next thing todo will be to look for a will. It's also worth starting to sort out her papers, look for evidence of bank accounts, shares etc. You'll need these for probate. It's also worthwhile notifying banks etc of the death, though you'll need the death certificate first e.g. this is the Barclays link https://www.barclays.co.uk/what-to-do-when-someone-dies/notify-us/

I just googled funeral services and chose a funeral director near me. He was lovely and took care of most of the details. The sorts of questions they will ask are do you want burial or cremation, is there going to be a wake if so where? (the funeral directors drove the family to the wake after the funeral) What sort of coffin, what clothes would you like her to be wearing etc. You can claim the funeral expenses back from the estate later. To give some context, inner city London, a cremation with the cheapest casket (the funeral director's suggestion for cremations) cars, a celebrant, flowers and a wake at a local hotel cost just shy of £5k.

Once a funeral date has been agreed with the funeral director you can order flowers, choose any readings and music etc. We had a humanist celebrant, DH, DUncle and one of his fishing buddies spoke, and we made the order of service ourselves using MSPublisher. It helps to use others to notify about the funeral dates. If she belonged to any societies/clubs/W.I. etc, notifying the secretary and asking them to circulate details of the funeral will make your life easier.

After the funeral, take a breath and allow yourself to grieve before tackling the issue of wills and probate.

Yes if its all coming to you it's easy. I spoke to them a couple of times on the phone and they were helpful with filling in the forms.
Don't try do do everything or think of everything all at once. Take baby steps, just make a note of when you call someone or fill something in. Don't let this take over your life. Go for walks, watch a film, take a bath. To put my timeline into context - DM died in July, the house was cleared and sold by the end of the year. I phoned around quite a few solicitors for the house sale and found one I felt more comfortable with where I wouldn't have to go through a secretary. This was all during lockdown and I generally tried to sort one thing out a day at lunchtime. Eg one day speak to her mobile phone company, one day ask one bank how her case was coming along. Make sure to get 3 or 4 copies of her death certificate as you may have to send them off.

I'm very sorry to hear that your mother has died.

I’m sorry for your loss. The shock is awful, don’t underestimate its effects.

Try not to look at the big picture for now ( probate, houses etc..). It’s too overwhelming. One job at a time.
Register your mum’s death. Get several copies of the certificate as you’ll have to produce it many times and most won’t accept photocopies.
Funeral Director, locate Will and arrange funeral.
Everything else will take time and you can do it bit by bit.

Look after yourself. That’s important.

I'm sorry too.
Just to add that not all areas have Tell us once, but if they do, use it! Also I didn't need my parents birth or marriage certificates so no need to go looking for those.
Get a few copies of the death certificate as you often have to send them off so it helps to have several originals. Institutions tend to be quite quick about sending them back.

Im sorry for your Loss OP
So much of the leg work can be done by using the tell us once service and then letting the funeral director take care of most of the details around the funeral. They wont do anything without your approval but they will gently lead you in the right direction. If you do want to go off plan they will not stand in your way though so make sure the family talks things through.
You really dont have to do a lot of what is considered the norm. No announcement in the local paper , no flowers , even no wake if you dont want to .
Its really up to you and yours what happens.

Lean on DP. That's what Partner means.

Empty the fridge and freezer.

give any cans and unopened packages of food you won’t use to rhe food bank

emptying the house will be an upsetting process. You can short circuit it at a cost by taking the things you want to keep yourself, or that may be valuable, and letting house clearers take the rest. They will often do a clean as well.

My mum was super organised so had put together stuff like details of all her accounts, usernames, passwords etc. Had been training my dad up for taking on more life admin over the last year (she had cancer so it was expected). My sister and me helped with a lot of the immediate stuff, and what I found hardest was telling people. Especially people like an old university friend living abroad now who I didn't even know, hadn't met since I was a small child. I went for sending lots of slightly tweaked emails; that's 2020s for you. Obviously we phoned immediate relatives, and got some to then cascade the message along to other more distant relatives. After a while doing the more admin calls and having to say "I'm calling to notify you that my mother the account holder has died" got routine, but it was strangely difficult and I felt bad almost for embarrassing the workers on the other end who were sideswiped by it! Classic British social awkwardness. You just have to take it as it comes, and try to see minor moments of humour in how surreal it can get.

If this is England and you were joint tenants, rather than tenants in common (legal term) your Mum's share of the property will automatically pass to you so that's one thing you don't need to worry about. It will take a bit of time to get all the bills transferred into your sole name, but all the utility companies I've dealt with have had good procedures for this and specially trained bereavement teams who have (almost all) been really kind and clear on the phone. You can do a fair bit online too. No need to rush any of this, as others have said.

This is for well in the future, but unless it's a very high value property and/or your Mum had a lot of savings/investments, there probably won't be any inheritance tax to pay. There's a calculator on the gov.uk website that will help you check that. https://www.gov.uk/valuing-estate-of-someone-who-died/estimate-estate-value#use-the-online-inheritance-tax-checker

Firstly sorry for your loss. Number one priority is to choose a funeral director, they will then talk you through the process of arranging the funeral, though it will help if you think about what you want before meeting them.

Next you register the death, they will give you a code for the government tell us once service which will inform most governmental agencies.

As soon as you get the death certificate you need to inform the insurance company that your mum was with that the house is empty, they will give you instructions of what to do to ensure it is secure and remains insured, this varies obviously (eg we had to remove jewellery and one specific piece of furniture).

Next cancel tv licence, pay tv, telephone(s) and inform utilities. If you can get hold of bank statements you can check for other payments going out. Sorn the car if kept off road if applicable.

If you haven't already remove perishable food from the house

Write down things as completed - it helps keep track

I am so sorry for your loss. You have received some excellent practical advice so I'm not going to repeat that.
Your DH has been through it himself, although he has siblings, so hopefully he will be able to help you.
The main thing I would say, is that there is a lot to remember at a time when it is going to be difficult for you. I coped by getting a whiteboard and writing everything I needed to do on there, including dates it needed to be done by. It is good to be able to wipe things off when they are complete.
All the utility companies, banks etc. have procedures set up for this kind of thing, so don't worry. The funeral company we used were amazingly helpful - it is their job to be. Some things need to be done soon, but other things can wait - don't worry about those at the moment, you will have enough to do and to think about at the moment. Do them when you need to or when you can.
Use whatever help people offer you - including on here.

Thank you all so much. Mum died in her sleep early hours of this morning in her own bed by the looks of things. When I got there the call handler on 999 insisted I do chest compressions for 30 minutes. I knew it was pointless and she was dead. I could handle the fact she died it was the needless dragging her around that's broken me. That's why I feel like I can't even cope with the next tasks. Thank you all

So sorry about your Mum. Remember that while doing chest compressions was awful for you that your Mum knew nothing about it.

IIRC there’s a booklet called ‘What to do when someone dies’ - I think it’s from Which?

That sounds terribly hard. Will there have to be a post mortem, or had she been ill and it was to some extent expected? I hope it went all right telling the children.

sorry for your loss
Noting what someone else said about getting multiple copies of the death certificate- I got 8 copies when my mother died last year, and only have one copy left. Copies will need to be sent to mortgage provider, banks etc and while they can send them back it can take an age
Also if you owned your house jointly with your mother make sure ownership is transfer to your name only. My father died six years ago and my mother never transferred ownership of the house to her name only after he died, so that was a legal middle we had to work through....