Giving partner control of my savings if I die

[confettiballoons]

I’ve been with my partner for ten years and we have 3 children. We’re not married, as firstly I don’t believe in it, and secondly he had a historical gambling problem and we decided many years ago to ensure he had no access to our savings. He works, but I earn 4x more and all assets (car, house) and savings are just in my name - he transfers me money from his salary each month. How can I prepare that if I were to die suddenly he gets access to my money to keep paying the bills? I have a will which leaves everything to our children but I don’t know in practise how he would quickly access money that he would need.

Do you want him to have access, or are you concerned that he can't be trusted to be responsible with the money on your children's behalf?

There is no quick way if you die for him to get access to your money. The only things the bank will release are to pay funeral costs and tax bill until probate is sorted, that includes if there is a will.
Even money in a joint account will be stopped and can be difficult to access if one person dies.
Someone may be along with more info but that has been my experience of dealing with relatives who have died.

Posted too soon... you can get power of attorney so he can access them if you are incapacitated however this is also null and void if you die.

@sunseed I think it’s a bit of both. Practically, I’d want him to raise our children, and use the money I would leave to continue the lifestyle that they have (we’re not super well off but on his salary alone he wouldn’t be able to keep our house etc.). If something happened to me tomorrow (not planning on it!) then next month the mortgage and car payments would bounce for example if my work stopped paying me and no-one could access my savings. But I also wouldn’t want him to get everything in one go because I don’t think he’d be able to manage it (I’d worry about the gambling). So I’m wondering if there’s a way of kind of paying someone longterm to manage it for him? Like a lawyer or a bookkeeper? Or is that a trustee? Could I use a relative as a trustee and leave them the money to pay for stuff on his and my children’s behalf?

Thanks @littleblackno. The reason I was thinking about this is that I’ve just lost a grandparent to Covid and the remaining grandparent cannot access funds right now in a joint bank account even though they were married which made me realise that my own situation could cause major financial issues in the short term.

And thank you for comments. I expect I need to speak to a professional but I’m not sure whether lawyer or accountant!

You say the mortgage payment would bounce. Do you not have life insurance to pay the mortgage should you die?

Also, if you did die, he'd have to let your creditors know, so I would hope they'd be understanding in relation to upcoming payments.

Perhaps not the proper way to go about things, but my mum has entrusted me with a reasonable amount of cash so that when she dies, I can cover any outgoings for a couple of months whilst accounts are sorted out formally. Do you have a trusted friend or relative with whom you could make a similar arrangement?

You are right to be wary of "joint" accounts being frozen and your DP being left cashless. I know of two examples in the past year.

@NoWordForFluffy yes I do. Actually had forgot about that, tho again I assume it would take a little while to unlock and I’m thinking the month or two after death when I might not be being paid but bills are still coming out. But as I do have the assets to sort stuff out, and a will leaving stuff to kids but acknowledging his need to bring them up, so maybe it feels like just super short term cash flow to think about.

@MaggieFS yes I was wondering that. Sounds a bit nuts and morbid but someone to have a bit to tied them over until everything gets unlocked. I have a sister I am super close to and he would trust to help manage things.

Thank you both, that’s actually super helpful.

Could consider setting up trust funds
www.moneyadviceservice.org.uk/en/articles/using-a-trust-to-cut-your-inheritance-tax

I've heard about some insurance companies paying really quickly actually. As long as your partner knows where all of the paperwork is to contact people then it may not be as bad as you're anticipating.

Do you even have will? You really do need some advice. There's a very good person on here if you can find her.

If you want the money to go to your children I wouldn’t.

My dad did this and passed and when step mum passed it went to god knows who but not me and my siblings. We never even found out where it went

@Wallywobbles

Do you even have will? You really do need some advice. There's a very good person on here if you can find her.

From the op - I have a will which leaves everything to our children but I don’t know in practise how he would quickly access money that he would need.

I think you need a lawyer. When we we're making our wills, we we're told the guardian for our children (in your case your DP) didn't have to be the same person as the trustee who manages the money, so I guess you should be able to appoint your sister, for example, to that role.

I agree with giving some cash to trusted sister for initial costs. I've given my daughter 5k (she's put it in an ISA) so when I go she and my son don't have any immediate cash worries while waiting for probate. Is this a discussion you can have with your partner or would it freak him?

Leave the money to your children in trust until a certain age, with named trustees who you trust and who all know about his problems. He would need to ask them for permission to access all money on behalf of the kids. In practice this is really quick - but your trustees can ask for proof of payment and keep track of outgoings.

I am surprised that people have had problems accessing a joint account after death of one of the holders.

When my Dh died I phoned my bank and they froze his access but I continued to use the account as normal. Once I showed them the death certificate they sent me a new cheque book and changed account name to my name only.

Even kept the same account number - useful for existing direct debits, salary/pension payments etc.

I had access to our joint account when my husband died too. No concerns at all.

@confettiballoons

You need urgent advice in drawing up a will which outs what you want into effect. In essence yes you can leave all your money to your children but place it in trust for them with a couple of people you trust implicitly to act as trustees. You can then write the terms of the trust which trustees to release money for the support and upkeep of the children. You can also direct that their father be allowed money for support if you wish.

If you die intestate, then depending in the size of your estate you will probably find the majority doesn't go to the children!

If you are leaving ‘everything’ to your children then that would include the savings so he couldn’t easily access them anyway. Plus I don’t know how old your kids are but where would he live - in a house owned by the kids? What about when they want to sell it? It sounds like he has contributed to the household so he would be due back some of his investment - just because you’re not married doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a claim for anything, or doesn’t own anything.

Seems a little bit mean that you’re leaving him with nothing.

@funnyfive yes I think you’re right. I do have a will, done by the fab lady on here actually (Mumblechum) but it was 9 years ago when I was pregnant and we hadn’t been together long so I felt a bit different. Now we’ve 3 kids and another one on the way and we’ve built a good life based mainly on him supporting me in my career so yes, I would want to include him but not in a way that would bring out his issues with money because giving him access to a lump sum wouldn’t be fair (I’m honestly not being tight, we’ve talked about this and he can’t trust himself with larger amounts).
I will review Will and look at trust funds and also how I can look after him, obvs yes by securing the house in his name maybe. He would never sell a house or anything, it’s more cash in a bank account he doesn’t want. I’ll also pull out insurance paperwork into an obvious place and give some short term funds to sister as well.

And yes, @lifestooshort I could have the chat with him about plans. I mean, those kind of chats are never fun but I could go just in case nasty stuff happens this is what you need to know so you’re all ok.

@confettiballoons mumblechum still writes wills as the same company it can often be easier to update the old will with the same person -no going over old ground.

Given his issues and huge financial disparity I would suggest never getting married as otherwise you could be financially stripped and jeopardise the children's financial security.

Of course if it was the other way around then the advice would of course be different!!!!