Bank account closure

[IkeaJesusChrist]

My nan passed away over the Christmas period.

She had severe dementia and she was living in a care home that was at least being partially funded by her pension, she had no other assets including a house because prior to moving into the care home she was a Housing Association tenant all her life.

My parents are trying to navigate the steps, they've registered her death etc and started to arrange the funeral.

Yesterday they discovered that the Local Authority had closed her bank account over a year ago, apparently this was done by her Guardian Angel. My father was next of kin and he wasn't informed of this, he was stunned when the bank told him.

Is this normal process? My parents are waiting for a phone call from the Local Authority to try to untangle what has happened but this is a complete curveball and it's left the funeral arrangements up in the air.

How does it affect the funeral arrangements? Are you paying or is there a funeral plan?

There's no funeral plan.

My parents were under the impression that there would have been some money in the account to pay towards the funeral and they would make up the shortfall.

My father is next of kin, should the Local Authority have informed him that they had closed the bank account?

Not necessarily I think. Did he have power of attorney? I think they have to let the account holder know but maybe your nan was not up to understanding or remembering that.

The key question is whether there was any balance left in the account. Will the bank help? Presumably if you have her death certificate and ID they will at least talk to your dad as next of kin.

If she was LA funded, most of her pension would have been going directly to care fees. But she still had to receive payments somehow, and had to be left a small amount for.expenses. So there must be an account somewhere.

When you say 'guardian angel', I assume.you mean an official appointed guardian because nobody had PoA. These often look after multiple people so it's possible guardians have a group of accounts all with the same bank, rather than keeping everyone's individual accounts - just for ease of administration. But they must be able.to account for all income and outgoings, and what happened to any savings (savings under £16k can be used for day-to-day expenses but cannot be used to pay towards care).

I'm assuming that you mean a Guardian was appointed to look after your Nan's affairs because nobody had POA for finance too

Thank you everyone you've all helped.

The matter has been resolved.

Glad it's been resolved for you.