to wonder who registers a death, when there's no nearby family?

[TressiliansStone]

Inspired by the thread about disposing of a medical skeleton, I'm finally sorting out leaving my body to a medical school.

But reading the instructions for Next of Kin, it occurs to me I don't have anyone local to do all this, and... I don't even have anyone to register my death.

I registered my father's death – I lived in the same registration district as him. But when it comes to me, I've no family or close friends within hundreds of miles.

So, who will get lumbered?

If you have no NOK then normally, the local authority will do it and organise the funeral. If you have no funds in place from your estate and no relatives who have the cash then it will be covered by the DWP.
The LA will be responsible (I believe) for getting the green form from the registrar and then going ahead with organising the funeral.
All attempts to find NOK and any family members are normally made by the police.

I highly recommend getting a funeral plan on place. The costs of funerals is rapidly growing, including third party fees such as cremation, doctors, celebrants etc.

Sorry, missed the bit about leaving your body to a medical school!
I suppose you could give them permission to register you after death?

It's a social worker who usually does it.

I did it once when I was a trainee solicitor. There was no family and we were handling the estate. I collected the personal effects from the hospital too.

I do have family, who I imagine will have no difficulty paying between them (and then recouping if I leave an estate, but I'm the poor relation so...).

We're just a bit far flung.

It's only just dawned on me that having no one local would be a problem.

Having done my dad's stuff, I'm planning to make sure all my documents are in an obvious place, with BIG LABELS and addresses for NoK and solicitor who has my will (also not local).

Also, if my body is accepted by the medical school, they'll bear transportation costs to the school and then cremation costs (no official cremation ceremony).

So there won't be any costs on my NoK unless they choose to do extra stuff off their own bat.

Just found this on Citizens Advice website which says death can be registered elsewhere - assuming your relatives are in the same country.

When someone dies at home, the death should be registered at the register office for the district where they lived. If the death took place in hospital or in a nursing home it must be registered at the register office for the district in which the hospital or home is situated. In England and Wales, if it is convenient, you can go to a different office to register the death and the details will be passed on to the correct office.

See, that's what's just dawned on me.

There's unlikely to be anyone in the same country. We're split across the the UK countries – and a fair few others for good measure.

The solicitor who keeps my will is also in a different UK country. I'd rather not pay out money I don't have just to retain a solicitor local to where I live now, for something not necessarily imminent. But I wonder if I'll have to?

You don't have to be local to register a death. My DGM died in Surrey and my aunt registered it at the registrar near her own home in East Yorkshire; my mum was away. This was 2017 and we had no bother.

So as long as you have steps in place so that they know, you should be fine.