ITC Legal Services - Avoid Them

angrygirlie

45,000 views Nearly 1,000 in just over a week

Lets hope many of those latest views have now chosen not to use ITC......

angrygirlie

from the beginning


At the beginning of taking on ITC Legal services back in January 2008, one of the executors of my mothers' Will was required to send proof of his identity to ITC.
ITC managed to return these sensitive ID papers back to the completely wrong address!!! As the letter sent back from ITC was a ‘signed for’ letter, the lady who received it (and who thankfully was honest) opened the letter and very kindly hand delivered it to the correct address (as the ID contained the executors address)
This was the first inkling that I had that this company was not all professional, as I considered this a very serious mistake by a so called ‘professional company’ in days of serious identity fraud.
In my first letter of complaint to ITC (which was sent after only 3 months that ITC had started the administration) this issue was just one of the 6 that I raised, yet I have never been given a valid reason or explanation how they could of got the address so wrong.

This was my experience as a client of ITC Legal Services

portlandboy

angrygirlie wrote: »

from the beginning


At the beginning of taking on ITC Legal services back in January 2008, one of the executors of my mothers' Will was required to send proof of his identity to ITC.
ITC managed to return these sensitive ID papers back to the completely wrong address!!! As the letter sent back from ITC was a ‘signed for’ letter, the lady who received it (and who thankfully was honest) opened the letter and very kindly hand delivered it to the correct address (as the ID contained the executors address)
This was the first inkling that I had that this company was not all professional, as I considered this a very serious mistake by a so called ‘professional company’ in days of serious identity fraud.
In my first letter of complaint to ITC (which was sent after only 3 months that ITC had started the administration) this issue was just one of the 6 that I raised, yet I have never been given a valid reason or explanation how they could of got the address so wrong.

This was my experience as a client of ITC Legal Services

Professional they are not, but they are consistent.
I received documents regarding a deed of variation belonging to a client of ITC who lived in Yorkshire with a surname starting with "E", yet I live in Dorset and my surname starts with "B". I contacted the clients directly (since I thought they should be aware that I had their names, address and details of the will of the deceased). They were very concerned, yet ITC saw no real problem with their failures under the Data Protection Act. Their reaction was "Sorry, but these things happen"!!! My case manager was a little annoyed that I had contacted the other client - probably because she was going to need to think up an excuse.

angrygirlie

As you say, how consistent they are at not getting it right.

The mind boggles how they get away with it.

Helpfulsoul

I used to work for itc , and I have to say in the first instance the staff are not to blame for what goes on there. Some of the staff are dealing with over one hundred and twenty cases, you can imagine how difficult that must be especially when they are in the middle of dealing with someones estate and then they have to answer phone calls in the middle of it, i`m not saying that as customers you should not ring in but if you saw what the staff are dealing with you would understand.The work loads are too high. the staff turnover rate is huge even senior managers have told me the staff turn over rate needs looking at, it should be setting off alarm bells.My advice to anyone is put your assets into joint names with your spouse and then use local solicitor or accountant for any tax liability you may have.

portlandboy

Helpfulsoul wrote: »

I used to work for itc , and I have to say in the first instance the staff are not to blame for what goes on there. Some of the staff are dealing with over one hundred and twenty cases, you can imagine how difficult that must be especially when they are in the middle of dealing with someones estate and then they have to answer phone calls in the middle of it, i`m not saying that as customers you should not ring in but if you saw what the staff are dealing with you would understand.The work loads are too high. the staff turnover rate is huge even senior managers have told me the staff turn over rate needs looking at, it should be setting off alarm bells.My advice to anyone is put your assets into joint names with your spouse and then use local solicitor or accountant for any tax liability you may have.

...But every one of those "blameless, overworked, misunderstood & unappreciated" staff can just walk away (as you say they do). The poor bereaved, lost and helpless WAGE-PAYING & ITC PROFIT-ENHANCING CUSTOMERS just have to put up with the resulting crappy, non-caring, inaccurate, slow service provided by ITC for many months and even years, without any way out (except paying even more money).
I'm sorry that employees see the constant phone calls as disruptive, but the point is, as staff at ITC, YOU WORK FOR US.
Do you honestly imagine that all of the probate problems can be overcome by owning property jointly with a spouse??? The probate applications that are mis-managed by ITC are mostly brought about by surviving children, nephews or nieces, not husbands or wives. Your "helpful" statement shows an obvious misunderstanding of the issues that you must have dealt with. There are very few cases mentioned on this thread which involve a remaining spouse.
As you might imagine, my heart (and those of the others on this thread) is not likely to bleed for anyone who works for ITC, not now or ever. I only hope that each one of you who feels that the customer is such a pain may, one day, be wearing the shoes of one of ITC's victims.

(And I didn't swear in print once - that's proper professional of me!!)

angrygirlie

Helpfulsoul wrote: »

I used to work for itc , and I have to say in the first instance the staff are not to blame for what goes on there. Some of the staff are dealing with over one hundred and twenty cases,

Dear HelpfulSoul,

Thank you for your insight, but personally, I feel that, if I applied for, and was successful to gain a job with a 'professional' Probate specialist company, only to find myself having to deal with an overload of bereaved clients chasing the company for information and updates, and that I felt l had lack of training and knowledge (via the company ) to deal with such sensitive and personal issues, then I, as a person of average awareness and good morals, would not be comfortable to work in this situation and environment.
And to have knowledge that the company are unregulated, I'd rather busk in the streets with a tin whistle than earn a wage working for such a company. I would not sleep at night if I did not have the power within such a company to ensure that the client was treated with respect, correctly informed and treated with humility.
The staff ARE the company as it is they who operate on the frontline and do what the management tell them to do... I just hope it did not take you too long to see how ITC operated.

Sadly, It was the staff who misinformed me and sent me incorrect letters, who lost documents, who created more problems between myself and another executor, who added up the figures incorrectly, who did not contact me with very important information, who sent me the bill with charges on there that I was not expecting, who sent me letters with inadequate stamps on so I had to pay handling fees to receive the post, who told me there was no IHT to pay but at the end, over £5,000 IHT was (incorrectly) paid, who tried to deny me the return of my mothers paperwork and so on and so on.
If one works for the company, one represents the company.

Deep_Throat

Couldn't agree more.They are a bunch of smug self regarding clowns who really shouldn't be allowed near this type of work which they are singularly ill equiped to deal with.Avoid at all costs!

angrygirlie

Hold onto your hats as this is a long post. This one is very personal to me but I need to tell it.

Before my mum died, I had looked into administering her estate myself and felt that (as her estate was quite straightforward) that I would have a go at undertaking the task. However, a few months before my mum died, I had a terrible incident with my brother (I will not reveal his real name, so I will call him Eric)
This incident happened in my mums home (where I lived and cared for her), and I had to call the police out as I was in a total fear. The incident was classed as domestic, but I can assure you the word domestic does not mean it was trivial. It was a terrifying incident which came out of the blue. This put a terrible strain on the situation at home as my mum was terminally ill and was going downhill rapidly. After the incident, I would lock myself in my room during Eric’s daily visits to mum.
When mum died, I knew that things would now get out of control with him and sure enough, they did. When mum’s Will was released, the worse case scenario came to life…we were both named executors.
I contacted the police and they advised me not to communicate directly with Eric and to get a solicitor to sort out the Will………
That’s why I phoned The Bereavement Advice Centre, for advice about my situation. And they said ITC would be able to mediate and act on behalf of the executors
(I’m sure you can you now see why I now have such a deep anger about this company because I was more than just vulnerable at the time. I was in a state of utter despair and distress)
ITC knew the reasons for them being instructed, and they told me that there was no problem and that they would mediate so I did not need to communicate with Eric in an executors role…they would do all of that for me.
Less than 2 weeks after ITC were instructed to act on the executors behalf, Eric was finally arrested for harassing me. I contacted ITC immediately to tell the how bad the situation now was between us but…………

I cannot tell you how this company caused so much more friction between Eric and I through them miscommunication of information between us. Even I cannot believe how bad they were, but of course, Eric would never believe me. He thought that I was trying to get one over him because he was either
Not communicated to
Or
Mis informed
For instance, Once ITC were instructed, they needed all the Power of Attorney forms signed by the executors so they could start the process. A few weeks passed and ITC kept telling me that they had not had Eric’s POA returned and this was holding it up. I thought that this was him being difficult. It was later revealed that they did have his POA but didn’t bother to inform me when they received it.
On another occasion ITC asked me what I wanted to do about XYZ, I asked ITC to contact Eric to ask him what he wanted to do about XYZ, but they wrote to him and say that I had instructed them to do XYZ and did he agree with me? (Any of you dealing with an estate as family and executors, you know how fraught things are on a good day) This man went ape and caused me more problems. To date he still accuses me of ‘going behind his back’
On another occasion ITC needed Eric’s consent for me to go ahead and sell an item of mums. They contacted him, he said yes……. But they did not tell me he had agreed. So again, I think he’s being difficult and holding things up.
I found out (through family meeting) that he’d given consent over 21 days earlier.

These nightmare situations slowly eroded my sanity away…a company totally inefficient, not able to get it right, then inflaming a serious situation with my brother and I (who I believed that I was doing the right thing at the start by taking them on to avoid any stress and hassle AND to protect myself from any accusations of not administering the estate correctly myself HUH), but in fact it was the most destructive decision that was ever made instructing ITC Legal Services to do the job.
I eventually had a nervous breakdown. There’s only so much one can take.
Just over a year ago, (long after I was no longer an executor as administration was finalised in November 2009) I was at the wrath of Eric’s outbursts about mum's estate again (in public and witnessed by about 150 people). A police escort out of the area and another harassment order. The relationship will never mend and the ghosts of what has happened will never go away.


This was my experience as a client of ITC legal Services (and this is on medical records and police records)

portlandboy

Angriegirlie,

I'm not being flippant when I say "I hope that feels better". I know that you have waited a long time to be able to put these things out for all to read.

I really believe that some people don't see the full picture behind the story and (as in one or two posts, "timmyt" being one) they just see that getting caught up with crap like ITC is the fault of the customer.

My dad was very active and died completely unexpectedly. I found him the day after I was released from hospital where he had visited me every day for 2 weeks. The week after I cremated him I went back into hospital for an amputation (and a further month in a ward). That is why I thought that using ITC would reduce the stress for me. Everyone who uses ITC, having been "guided" by trusted banks or bereavement-trained local council staff expects to get a professional service.

The saddest thing about all of this is that there is nobody around afterwards to catch you when you fall...