When Dh passes will they freeze our joint bank account?

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I rang our UK bank today. The lady didn’t fill me with confidence when she said she was sure they wouldn’t. I asked for a definite answer but unfortunately her English left me unsure. A search on the internet seemed to say they wouldn’t but I would like to know 100%.

I’m nursing him at home at the moment so going to the branch in town is not an option.

If the joint account doesn't require a signature to transfer money, can you not transfer any funds to your personal account just to be safe?

They assured my mum they wouldn't do that when my dad passed away, but when it happened they absolutely did freeze the account. So as the other poster says, if you can transfer some funds to another account I would encourage you to do that.
Sorry you're having to go through this and keeping you and your husband in my prayers.

No-if you have a joint account that money is automatically yours. It won't be frozen, it will become a single name account. My mum put my name on her account as a joint account after my dad died. I never used it but could have if she needed me to. When she died the bank simply took her name iff the account and it became my account.

You will have to go in and tell them and take his death certificate for that to happen but the account will not be frozen in the meantime and you can use it as normal.

So sorry you are facing this.

When my husband died, the joint account was simply transferred to my name only - the bank were actually very helpful and got Internet banking set up in my name within a few days. Nothing was frozen.

This is exactly what happened to me.

I am sorry you are in the situation OP and would recommend that you always ask to speak to the bereavement specialist at the bank. They are usually really helpful and kind.

They shouldn’t freeze a joint bank account.

The thing that caught us out was that you can’t technically have joint credit cards - so if the main cardholder dies, the additional cardholder can’t carry on using their card. We’d just assumed that got transferred over to the remaining cardholder as well, but no.

No, a joint account will not be frozen on the death of one of the account holders, unless the bank are making serious errors. That is the whole point of having a joint account, and it was what kept me afloat for more than a year as it took ages to deal with DH's probate.

No joint accounts are not frozen.

There is a service called Death Notification Service which allows a user to notify many institutions like banks and so on. It worked very well for me.

I believe there is an equivalent for public bodies like council tax or tax.

Neither Barclays nor Nationwide froze joint accounts (current accounts if that makes any difference) when my dad died this year. When they saw the death cert they just transferred it into my mum's sole name. The only joint savings account they had was with Tesco Bank, which also got transferred (and not frozen). Credit cards are different as a pp said.

Sorry for your loss. Unfortunately Royal Bank of Scotland very much did freeze the joint account when my Dad passes away earlier this year. I hope you and your family are as ok as you can be.

*passed

Same here

I'm sorry you're going through this with your DH. 🤗

Banks. It seems a mixed bag. We had a situation when my Dad died (too complicated to explain) we had just explained my Dad had died suddenly, & we were waiting for his death certificate blah blah blah. The stupid woman insisted nothing could be done until he went into the branch & signed the papers. How I didn't smack her one I don't know.

So sorry you're facing this situation.

When I helped my Dad with all the bank stuff when my Mum died, the bank lady told us a colleague hadn't informed the bank of her husband's death for nearly 2 years and this was totally fine. So there's no need to rush to inform banks anyway.

My dad passed away last year and the joint account he had with my mum was not frozen. This was with the Royal Bank of Scotland and it was very quick and easy to get it changed to my mum's name only. We are in Scotland, if that makes any difference.

Transfer all money to your own account

Joint account won't be frozen but please check your credit card as they are not joint, and if your husband is the name on the account you will not be able to use it.

Thank you all.

Lloyds / Halifax won't freeze your joint account.
Sole accounts would be frozen, you would need to give them death cert and then as long as it is below the probate amount once they have seen it they will close all down and move into your designated account.
(Pending the will etc)

And the joint accounts will be made sole. You can do a lot of this on the phone with Lloyds

Hope you are ok and sending prayers to you & your husband.

This sounds like a mistake for which you are entitled to compensation, probably to the tune of a few hundred pounds, if you can be bothered.

You can look up decisions made by the financial ombudsman to get an idea of the value of the compensation, then contact RBS initially, and then the financial ombudsman if they are not forthcoming.

Sorry you had to deal with the inconvenience and stress of their mistake at an already upsetting time.

Just to add, my dh died in February and I found all the banks to be very kind and helpful when I had to inform them. The vast majority of large companies have a specialist team to deal with bereavement- there will be a contact number on their website.

Didn’t risk it with my dads it was all going to my mum
just didn’t tell the bank for a bit till we had everything in place

So sorry to hear you are going through the last stages. My DH died in February and it's been a learning curve.

Joint account(s) should not be frozen but when you do notify them, they will remove your DHs name. Same like the deed to any joint property, the Land Registry simply removes his name and you become sole owner. If your property is not joint tenancy, work hard now to make that happen.

For starters, the banks won't know he's died until you tell them. So the bank accounts will remain active until you contact the bank. The banks are not included in the 'tell us once' service (not much is actually and you'll still need to contact the council, etc) and need to be told individually. The banks have all been very kind but the employees are strangely unaware of how to help beyond freezing an account which they seem to think will be a real comfort but is not really here nor there.

If he is able, ask/help your husband now to make a list of all his accounts and login details for them (not just bank accounts but utilities and apple ID and devices like laptops and anything else that needs a password) so that you can deal with most of this online. My DH did this well before he went into hospice without telling me and then when things were truly dire and he couldn't quite remember his passwords, it was really useful.

I didn't tell the banks immediately and being able to log in to his bank accounts was helpful so that I could see the scope of his committments and estate. Also, those accounts continued to pay utilities until I could transfer them into my name.

If your DH had ISAs, and you are his heir, you can keep these as ISAs without losing the tax advantage. When you contact the banks, ask how to do this, since I have found them all to be strangely unaware of how to help. There are some sensible things to do but you will have to guide them through the process.

Our joint account was with Santander and when my husband passed away no they did not freeze the account.