Inheritance Tax: Save £100,000s with simple advanced planning Article Discussion

monkey_spank

Since I require a Will myself, I've been following this and other threads concerning Wills with interest.

There seems to be an awful lot of dubious promoting going on, but the conclusions I have formed are as follows:

There seem to be 2 main contributors to this forum from the Willwriting profession and they are Localhero and Willman Rodders. The rest can be ignored as apart from the dubious promoting going on, they are not actually offering any advice to posters' problems.

Of the advice given, Localhero seems to offer clear and consistently good advice above all others. His website also provided clear and unfussy information.

Willman Rodders does seem to be ethical (in respect of the promoting activities) but I find his answers overly long and convoluted. He didn't actually answer Sloughflint's question about which of the two main Willwriting Organisations offer better protection of the public and I found his website a little too fussy.

He and the SWW don't want willwriters to be regulated, but I disagree. Comparing the two posters, I know which organisation I would put my faith in with respect to my Will - and that is Localhero's IPW. Every person that I've asked also want willwriters to be regulated - it's unbelievable it hasn't happended so far. This state of affairs would be unthinkable in most other European countries.

I look forward to Localhero's response to Sloughflint's question and the opinions of others.

Willman_Rodders

Thank you Monkey Spank for your feedback regarding my website. I welcome honest feedback, though I was a little surprised and disappointed you decided to post your feedback here on this web forum; most visitors to my site use the button on my home page. Still, each to his own.


So you have decided that regulation is the way forward. I agree that something needs to be done to protect the general public from malpractice within the will writing sector and I personally believe the way forward is a mixture of self regulation and public awareness. Evidence shows government regulation does not work; you only need to look at the continued abuse of 'the telephone preference service', and 'door-to-door' salesman to see that. You may point to the financial services sector as a success but closer inspection reveals the pension misselling, endowment misselling, Northern Rock and Equitable Life shambles. Ah, yes, clear evidence that regulation works - not!


How long have solicitors been regulated? And how many times do we read of errors they make in drafting wills? Yet more evidence that regulation does not work. All will writers, whether home-visit will-writers or solicitors, make mistakes, and will continue to do so.


Regulation will not erradicate errors, nor does it remove the rogues and malpractice from within the industry. It reduces customer choice to those few who are authorised to provide the service - and who can still rip off clients (but legitimately now).

Last time I looked at the IPW's petition only around 135 people had signed it. How many have done so as a result of localhero's promotion on this forum I don't know - but 135 is not a large number when I estimate the petition is half way through the total period of three months. What are the other members of the IPW doing? Are they unconvinced? In the discussion forum there were more people arguing against regulation than for it.


Moving on. Sloughflint commented:

All members undertake regular refresher training to update their knowledge.

Yes, 20 hours a year is the requirement. The members of the SWW are expected to do the same. As an IFA I used to have to undertake 50 hours a year. Most IFA's did far more than that. Most will writers undertake far more than the minimum. But if you wanted to get round the system, you can; ask any experienced IFA of the 'tricks' to increase their CPD hours.


Before leaving I want to return to Monkey Spank's comments. You wrote:

Willman Rodders does seem to be ethical (in respect of the promoting activities) but I find his answers overly long and convoluted. He didn't actually answer Sloughflint's question about which of the two main Willwriting Organisations offer better protection of the public

If you read the post I think you'll find I did answer Sloughflint's question. It might not be the answer you want but it is there. Further, 'long and convoluted' replies? They may be long in certain cases but I have only posted 132 times from which I have 141 thanks (from 75 posts). Indeed I appear to be one of the few regular posters who has achieved more 'thanks' than 'posts'. Localhero has posted 261 times, has 152 thanks (from 117 posts). I wonder which statistics show a more helpful ratio?


Finally, welcome Monkey Spank to the Forum; this thread is certainly getting new people to join the forum. I like your style of posting. In your very first post you casually wipe aside all will writers with the comment:

There seem to be 2 main contributors to this forum from the Willwriting profession and they are Localhero and Willman Rodders. The rest can be ignored as apart from the dubious promoting going on, they are not actually offering any advice to posters' problems.

and so having removed all but two you set about discrediting one of them to leave just one. Interesting. Very interesting indeed.

localhero

sloughflint wrote:

There seem to be two regular trustworthy contributors: Willman Rodders and Localhero. Both belong to different organisations.
Would either like to comment on which one is better if at all in view of the fact that solicitors apart from being expensive also have no requirement to take exams?

Hi Sloughflint,
You’ve raised an interesting question and in answering it I would like to respond to various points raised by Willman Rodders.

Whilst I agree that the professional standards of STEP are high (I often recommend them on this forum), their services are only appropriate for clients at the higher end of the wealth bracket and not appropriate for the vast majority of consumers requiring a Will; and in any case their fees are more comparable to those of solicitors.

I belong to the IPW. Membership to the IPW requires training in Willwriting and the passing of a Willwriting exam invigilated by an external assessor prior to entry. Upon joining, all members must hold Professional Indemnity Insurance worth £2m and receive continuing training. Our conduct is regulated and any members who breach the code of conduct or who do not meet the minimum hours required in continuing professional development each year face sanctions including dismissal. The IPW are campaigning for all Willwriters to be regulated so that the public can be guaranteed that their Will will be written by a competent professional.

At the moment the law allows anybody to sell their services as a Willwriter. I feel that it's unacceptable, as a Will is one of the most important documents that we'll ever have to sign. Badly written Wills cause all sorts of problems that are only usually detected when they turn up at the Probate Registry many years later. And by then they cannot be put right. Solicitors are only too pleased to earn huge fees trying to sort out the resulting mess.

At the moment the default position for three quarters of the population for their Wills is a solicitor. Since I have passed all of the law society exams, I feel able to criticise them without bias.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

the Law Society have extensive exams - but according to Localhero - may not include any training on drafting a will.

The law degree (or equivalent CPE/PGDL) has 7 core subjects. Equity and Trusts is the closest to Willwriting (and even that is academic rather than practical). The Legal Practice Course has 3 further compulsory subjects - property law, business law and litigation. Candidates can then choose 3 further subjects from many including Private Client:Wills Trusts and Estate Planning.

What I said is that solicitors do not face compulsory exams in Willwriting - not that there's no training available. I know several solicitors who are excellent at Willwriting, most are not; and Wills are often sold as a 'loss leader' in the hope of obtaining the probate work later, where there's a much greater earning potential.

Most will agree that solicitors operate a vague and usually expensive fee structure (based on how long you're sitting in their office) rather than a fixed fee that's quoted upfront. As a result many people either don't bother, or take their chances on a Willwriter.

Most people have no idea that anybody can be a Willwriter, and so whether they receive the professional service they've paid for becomes a lottery - and unfortunately it's unlikely they'll ever know whether lady luck was smiling on them when that nice reassuring willwriter wrote their Will.

The overwhelming majority of people once told of this fact, believe that yes, willwriters should be regulated.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

the SWW insists all its members either pass an exam (to show level of competence) or they hold other relevant external exam qualifications.

I would be interested to know what sort of other exams are relevant exactly. Before I started my Willwriting firm I worked for a Willwriter owned and run by a member of the SWW. Despite being very reassuring, I quickly realised he knew very little about law and was a complete liability.

Aside from that, he also had several unethical practices including charging clients a lot of money for ‘lifetime storage’ of their Wills despite the likelihood he wouldn’t be around in the 30 odd years when some of his clients were likely to die.

Before extricating myself from his shoddy and unethical practices, I discovered that he had formerly been an IFA (he jumped ship like many others when the financial services sector became regulated) and joined the SWW on the basis of his ‘financial background’ – presumably he had some idea about estate planning as an IFA.

He completed a one or two day course and he didn’t have to sit any exam in Willwriting or demonstrate any legal knowledge whatsoever.

Having paid his membership fee he could call himself a ‘professional Willwriter’. He was under no obligation to complete any further training at all – he was merely sent an annual return to declare how many hours he had completed, and what he declared was taken at face value.

So before setting up my own firm he was my motivation for seeking out an organisation with more stringent demands from its members.

Fortunately I discovered the IPW that required a certain legal expertise to be proven by passing an entrance exam PRIOR to joining the organisation. From then on, continuing professional development MUST be completed each year.

I personally don't think it’s adequate that an IFA (or anyody else for that matter) can become a Willwriter and a member of a professional organisation with such ease, and incidentally this individual is still in business, trading under a new company with a slick and very convincing website.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

The IPW has now launched a campaign to regulate all will writers. Localhero's forum signature refers to their campaign. Paul Sharpe, chairman of the IPW, was promoting the need to regulate the will-writing industry recently in the New Law Journal. To support his claims he quoted the same figures as Localhero posted earlier - these figures obtained independently by a survey the IPW itself commissioned. (It never ceases to amaze me how these independently commission surveys conclusions that sit conveniently with the commissioning body's viewpoint - but I am a sceptic.)

What are you suggesting, that the independent survey was rigged? How many of your clients do you bother to ask?

Willman_Rodders wrote:

Supporters of regulation point out it worked in the financial services sector, driving out untrained advisers from the industry. And, I agree it did

Great! It works then. The estate agents (another unloved and murky sector) started with self-regulation, now we have the Ombudsman scheme to help protect the public.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

Enforcement of regulation would be near impossible (and very expensive). To the 'man in the street' we are [nearly] all the same. The untrained will-writer will just side step the regulation requirements - and as a result be able to offer wills at a reduced price compared to their regulated competitor ... and thus gain more business.

That's exactly what's happening at the moment. The dishonest, unscrupulous and downright incompetent who don't bother to acquire a suitable level of competency demanded by the IPW are able to offer cheap/discounted Wills but the nasty surprises revealed in an earlier expose on this thread only emerge later on.

The point of regulation is that Willwriters must join a professional organisation that demands certain minimum standards or they can't operate. The cowboys would no longer be out there undercutting the good guys and giving the profession a bad name, and in fact IPW members are already operating to a code of conduct with no adverse affects.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

but if you only drafted a will once a week (or as in some cases less than once a month) that knowledge would soon disappear. Initial training, ongoing training, and regular drafting of wills does improve technical competence.

That's why all IPW members must meet all of the above as a matter of course.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

As another example of failed regulation, most of us drive cars. It is regulated in that we have to have pass a driving test. So do you speed? (33 mph in a 30 m.p.h. zone?) And how many times are you passed by someone who thinks they can drive faster than you? And how many uninsured drivers are there on the road? Regulation controls the many; it fails to control the rogues.

Are you saying that if we didn't need to pass a driving test to drive, the roads would be safer? What next, scrapping Corgi registered engineers and inviting the window cleaner in to fix the boiler?

Of course you cannot eliminate the very small minority of bad apples, but this is about competency. The public deserve to feel comfortable that their Will has been written properly and ethically.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

IPW members will point out that their professional indemnity premiums are less that those of the SWW. True. Does that therefore mean the IPW members are better than those of the SWW?

Insurers are in the business of assessing risk, so it would seem so.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

If they have a website, check this out.

A website that has been professionally designed and is written by somebody who can string a few sentences together provides no guarantee that the Wills will be any good -(see above), though I agree with Tatuma that poor grammar and spelling is not a very promising sign.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

prepare a range of questions such as: Which professional organisation are they a member of? What level of professional indemnity cover they hold? (£2,000,000 is the recommended minimum). How long have they been drafting wills? How many wills do they draft a week? Are they the drafter or just the salesman/instruction taker? What professional qualifications do they personally hold? What price will they charge for your circumstances?
What guarantees do they offer?

Who's going to remember all that lot realistically? Is it reasonable to place the onus on the member of the public who should receive a professional service as a matter of course?

Willman_Rodders wrote:

4. As the meeting progresses assess whether you feel comfortable with the adviser. If he/she seems unsure then do not proceed. If he/she just fills in a form (rather than asking questions around the form) do not proceed. If he/she just tells you the advantages of everything, and none of the downsides (and there are downsides to every choice) do not proceed. Find someone who will give you these answers.

If they're not qualified, they shouldn't even be in the house in the first place. Elderly and vulnerable people should never be placed in this position.

Willman_Rodders wrote:

My message is 'Education, Not Regulation

My message is Education (within Willwriters) AND regulation. And the sooner the better.

To answer your question Sloughflint, I believe the IPW are best placed to offer the public an ethical, competent and professional service when supplying them with their Wills.

We've already seen examples of the unscrupulous exposed on this forum. The law allows them and countless others to continue to operate - and the public deserves better.

It's time that Willwriters are regulated.

I am a Willwriter and member of the IPW. The views expressed here are my own in a personal capacity.

martinm_2

I am new to IHT, my Mother died 4 weeks ago, I am the only son.

The house and saving add up to about 420.000 pounds. Looks like I will pay 48k tax bill, do you think that is correct?

If I went to a financial advisory etc do you think they will save me more than the costs that they will charge for their services?

I have downloaded all forms etc and looks straight forward just a lot of money to pay out !!

Thanks

Martin

sloughflint

martinm wrote: »

The house and saving add up to about 420.000 pounds. Looks like I will pay 48k tax bill, do you think that is correct?

Was your Mum entitled to double the NRB or just single?

martinm_2

Sloughflint, my father died 22 years ago, by brother 10 years ago. The house is all paid for, not sure if that helps answer you?

I have just been made redundant, 3 weeks ago, so one thought was to keep the house and rent it for income if the future.

Martin

sloughflint

In that case if your Dad passed everything on to your Mum, then her NRB might be £600 000 so no IHT at all to pay.

sloughflint

If he passed only a percentage of his Estate to your mother, then her NRB would be her £300 000 plus a proportion of your Dad's NRB ( at today's rate of £300 000 not 22 years ago).
It might help if you said how your Dad's Estate was distributed.

martinm_2

Yes it was all passed to my mother, both my brother and I was living at home at the time. All my borthers money went to my mother when he died, I moved out 7 years ago but who has the NBR I thought that was me and it was fixed at 300,000 pounds?

Martin

sloughflint

You are going to be one very happy person ( about the IHT aspect of course.Sorry, that reads wrongly). No IHT to pay:j
( Your Mum's NRB is her own and your Dad's ie £600 000)