Probate services - what did you do and how did you find an appropriate service

[mids2019]

I have just finished a call with co op legal services which felt like a hard sell of rather expensive/legal services. It did give me thought for this matter but how did you all approach this?

Unless it's an extremely complicated estate you can do it yourself. I've done it for several family members. Lots of advice and info online and you will get it done far quicker than using a solicitor.

I have gone with a fab local solicitor, recommended by the solicitor who dealt with our house purchases/sales.
Yes, it may be possible to do everything myself, but quite frankly having just been bereaved less than a week I just cannot face it along with everything else.

Do it yourself. It’s easy and quick. And the probate phone line are brilliant at helping you too (unless of course it’s a complicated estate)

Thanks I am starting to get a concensus that you can do it yourself!

Did you have wills in all your cases?

(Really.feel a bit annoyed with the hard sell by the co op as part of their 'overall package' including such things as informing utility services etc. They did make it sound like this was a mandatory part of settling the estate and to not use them was going to be costly)

We did it ourselves once but the second time the estate needed to pay inheritance tax and the person died intestate. So we asked for recommendations from friends and found a great local solicitor.

It gives peace of mind that the inheritance tax bill won't leave you with a big bill to pay if you get it wrong.

But without inheritance tax it really is fairly straightforward.

we did it ourselves before lockdown and it took about a month.

I absolutely wouldn’t be paying a solicitor unless it was incredibly complicated. They charge a fortune and it also seems to take much much longer, presumably to help justify the cost.

I've done it twice and it really wasn't hard, you just need to be methodical - and the worst bit is getting all the account details and figures which I think you have to do anyway. And from what I hear it is vastly quicker than using a probate service

I used the solicitors my parents used to update their wills, but I did not go for the 'full service' package - with my parents' large, complicated estates, the bill would have run into tens of thousands.

I did all the contacting financial institutions, getting valuations and so on myself, and used the solicitors as a source of advice and to put all the final paperwork together and check and submit it.

I reckoned I was going to have to do most of the hardest work myself anyway - I can't imagine the solicitors would have been happy to wade through every piece of paper that had come through the door in the last 25+ years of my parents' lives, plus my father's important notes about family trusts scribbled in tiny writing on the backs of envelopes, which is what I had to do to find the relevant bits of information.

Really it depends on how big and complicated the estate is - if it is just a house, a couple of bank accounts and a life insurance policy, then DIY is probably the way to go, but if it involves multiple assets and trusts and so on then you may be glad of specialist support.

Definitely don't fall for the hard sell, though. There is really no need to pay a lawyer to fill in a form from British Telecom!

@mids2019 my Dh went from diagnosis to dying in 17 days. We got married under special license which invalidated our wills and there wasn’t enough time to redo them. So his estate falls partly under intestate rules and partly outside them.

It's possible to do it yourself (and save ££ in solicitors) even if it is complicated. You just have to work at it a little every day. There's help on the .gov website and most banks/ companies have bereavement helplines.

I'm dealing with a relatively complicated estate myself as an executor and it's taking a lot of time but it is possible to do.

DH used the coop for MIL as the introduction call showed an issue that arose from something being missed when FIL died. He was happy with the service.
Using a local solicitor for my DF at the moment but agreed with them that they will do up to probate and we will gather and distribute assets and change accounts, notify utilities etc etc.
I know I could do it all, but with providing support to DM I just don't want to do more admin than I have to.

I've done one simple estate and one more complicated estate. It's not hard; you just need to be careful and methodical. Definitely do it yourself - you'll save thousands.

The thing about doing it yourself is that a lot of what needs to be done, as PP's have already pointed out, is to get all the information together and know what to do with it.

The first time I did probate, I went through all the paperwork and wrote off to all the organisations, explained the circumstances and asking them about the next steps.

Next time round, I knew just to get all the info.

The only one I couldn't complete involved a trust which had been set up incorrectly. The solicitor knew how to negotiate with HMRC so we ended up not too seriously out of pocket on tax, easily justified their own costs in tax savings.

I did it myself. I hate admin, was very sad and prepared myself mentally over several days. It was surprisingly easy!

We used the co-op for my mil. I have to say, they didn't do any hard sell on us and we were very lucky with who we got given, she was absolutely amazing. If I emailed a question she got back to me within 24 hours, understood it was an emotionally difficult time and was just brilliant. We had to break the will so a little bit more involved.
After sorting everything out I really didn't have the time or headspace to do it myself so it was money very well spent in my eyes.

If it's a pretty straightforward will I'd recommend you do it yourself.
I did DM's, the thought of doing it was really scary but the reality was it was really easy.
All the info you need is online, it's so straightforward, I made a slight mistake and they emailed for clarification and I had to sign a statement basically saying that I wasn't lying.
To start with get the will, not a copy, then use the "tell us once" look on the .Gov website.
Seriously, doing probate is not difficult and it's seriously cheaper than a solicitor.
All the forms are on line with guides on how to complete them.

If you use a solicitor, you will still need to provide the information and once you have all the info, completing the form is the easy part.
For a straightforward estate it’s easy to do it yourself.
once you have a death certificate you can get a code for the tell us once service which you can use to inform HMRC, DVLA, state pension, library, blue badge, passport office …etc.

Our experience with the Co-op was awful, covered in previous posts if you’re interested. There were significant errors, lost documents, inaccurate advice. All started with a sales pitch and fear mongering. Lengthy time delays for no reason which meant the estate incurred additional costs. We made formal complaints and took it to the ombudsman.
It made a difficult time awful. Wish we’d done it ourselves. Galls me to this day that the estate funded such incompetence.

@Patiencerunningthin

Insensitivity hear about your experience.

Maybe hard sell was a strong term but the initial appointment with a 'probate specialist' was offered as part of the funeral care. An hour meeting was offered where the specialist explained probate from a script (he looked down at notes) emphasising all the problems of doing it yourself, using local solicitors, solicitor hourly rates. He then maybe a little patronisingly seemed to suggest normally the bereaved wanted someone to do absolutely all the admin and the co-op were offering a service to do that. He finished with costings (9K for 500K) estate, asked if I was happy and he would send the contract forthwith for me to sign.

I have dealt with double glazing salesmen and honestly the sales strategy is a little similar though obviously a little less pressing (though this guy seemed disappointed I couldnt remember the details of every bank account my DF held).

My concern was that for someone elderly wracked with grief this does seem a tempting easy option and the specialist really framed it as the only safe option denigrating other sources of private advice on the process.

That is a really inappropriate hard sell. Plus his information was inaccurate, if the estate isn't complicated it's fine doing it yourself. What a money making grab on the bereaved, I wouldn't be recommending them as a funeral service.

Before you engage a professional, you should ask what legwork you will need to do before they can start work.

In my mum's case, hers was a simple estate (with no will, so letters of administration but same process). It took an afternoon of going through all her paperwork*, which needed to be done anyway, to inform banks, utilities, pensions etc and making notes. Transferred that to the house online form and sent it off, was returned in a couple of weeks. Engaging a professional will still mean the trawling through paperwork to provide them the details to make the application. It doesn't speed up the process either.

• I did a really methodical job using an old exercise book to list each company and actions taken, balances outstanding, bills needing to be paid or balances ££

I did a really methodical job using an old exercise book to list each company and actions taken, balances outstanding, bills needing to be paid or balances ££
I did exactly the same (I'm a retired civil servant). Set dates to check for replies and chase up. The value of the estate even including the property was below IHT threshold and when I rang the IHT place for advice they didn't even insist on a formal valuation of the property. (North eastern town, cheap housing).

All the donkey work still has to be done by family even if you have a solicitor.
If there are trusts, large assets or family conflict then get a lawyer, though perhaps choose one you know and trust rather than one "recommended" by a funeral director.

Just been granted probate on an estate that involved IHT and even so it was pretty straightforward and I’m no legal expert. Be warned that the Probate Service won’t even let you chase up progress until your application has been with them for sixteen weeks. I rang them the first day I could and lo and behold two days later probate was granted.

@MrsLeonFarrell

Exactly. Doesn't help when you look at the answers to this thread!

Lots of use of legalese to frighten those in non legal professions with an emphasis of the huge legal burden that would be taken from your shoulders.

I do think people should be warned a bit as the co op are a large national funeral company and I don't think does their reputation any favours.

There was also the feeling given as that we have already engaged in the service then we were partly down the route already so should feel duty bound to sign the contract. I have worked in sales myself as a summer job at uni so know all the tricks.

Coming to this late, so you have probably decided what to do. My Dad died unexpectedly, my mother had died a few years before. Myself and my sibling agreed to obtain probate ourselves but I ended up doing all the work and my sibling refused to help. I just found it too much. I live hours away from where my father lived and had to go through his house alone, travel there to get the house valued. Do it all utterly alone whilst grieving and arranging the funeral. I think I was in shock about his death too and I got sick with a couple illnesses, one which lasted months. I ended up hiring a solicitor to help. Expensive but worth it if it is complicated estate.