Wills & Administration Costs - advice needed?

JPB_2

We agreed to see a consultant from PEP (Personal Estate Planning) to make joint/mirror wills for £78. Seemed a good deal as he came to our home in the evening. Generally it was very interesting what he explained about inheritance tax and about how if you let a bank or solicitor (who offer free will writing) they will charge you anything up to 5% of the estate value to administor the will. This could easily be a bill of £ks!!
Then came the sales pitch. They offer a service were they will execute your will for not more than 1%. If you are ever made executor of someone elses Will they will do it for you and again guarantee to do all the work for less than 1% of that estate. The charge = a one off payment of £2450!
We didn't go for that so they then offered for £750 a service were they will store your will and update it for free as many times as you want and guarantee that they will be executor of your will and not charge more than 2.5%?
Is this a rip off? They showed a Times report listing the charges that banks and solictiors make for administering a will and their sales pitch is that people worry about the incidental cost of will writing and don't think anything of the cost of administering the will. This is a service they say they will perform for a lot less than solictors or banks? Is this true or just a sales pitch? I have no experience of how difficult it is to administer a will and what the legal costs are? Any advice gratefully received.

Thanks

jos22

Rip off.
£750 will cover a lot of new wills. I don't know how much a solicitor would charge for drawing up a will, but they normally store free of charge.
On the basis that the estate is fairly straight forward, it is fairly easy to administer. It is however time comsumng gathering the information. This information would have to be gathered by the Executors even if they chose eventually to use a Solicitor.
My advice:-
Use a Will Writing Company if you wish - I leave others to argue the pros & cons.
Make sure that the Executors know where your will is.
Most importantly - keep a note of what assets you have & where (car, house, cash, investments etc), what liabilities you have & to whom (phone, gas, elect, rates etc) - and keep this updated.
Your Executors could if they wished pass the work over to Solicitors or other companies specialising in this.
http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/cms/wills.htm gives further advice on Probate so you can see what is involved.

jos22

Just noticed on the Web Site - they will store your will for £15.

elliebean_2

I have heard about PEP. I understand that they use quite aggressive selling techniques. They write your Will for a reasonable cost but then make their money by selling you other services. It's true that some banks and solicitors can charge up to 5% of the value of the estate but unless your estate is very complex it's usually unneccessary to appoint a professional executor and if needed, your nominated executors can choose to get help at the time.

darktrader

If I have a leaking tap, I call a qualified plumber.

When I need to have a Will written, I use a solicitor.

Will Writers. Personally, I wouldn't touch any of them with a bargepole.

As for the prices charged by solicitors, estates I have had personal dealings with, 2% was the highest. And with small estates there's often a flat fee.

Note:

I am NOT a solicitor
I HAVE had dealings with solicitors as an executor.
I HAVE had dealings with a Will Writer as an executor.

You get, mostly, what you pay for

JPB_2

Very helpful responses and largely what I suspected!
We won't be signing up for any of their additional services!

Many thanks