Wills and family matters

mjt14

I was wondering if anyone could advise me...

I am looking into securing a future for my family in the event of something happening to me. I don't have any assests - the only thing I would have to leave is my life insurance. My main concern is the welfare of my children and who I want to look after them if I am not around and my wishes etc for their future. Is it a Will that would include this information? Or do I need to get another type of document drawn up. As I said other than life insurance I don't have anything else to put in a Will and my main concern is having in writing what my wishes are for my children.

Thanks for any advice

Mojisola

If you don't have a will, someone will have to apply for a Grant of Administration to handle your estate. It doesn't matter if there isn't much money, someone has to get official authority to close your accounts, talk to the utilities, etc.

It's easier if you name the people you want to do this in a will, especially if you have children. You can say in a will who you would like to care for your children but the final decision would be made by Social Services.

InsideInsurance

It is a will that would deal with your wishes for your children.

I would hope that Life insurance was written in trust and thus isnt part of your estate and so doesnt go into the will. The trust would have its own instructions

Mojisola

Are other people going to be willing/financially able to bring up your children?

Would you want the insurance money to go into trust until the children are adults or would you want whoever is their carer to have access to it so that it can be spent on their upbringing?

securityguy

Mojisola wrote: »

If you don't have a will, someone will have to apply for a Grant of Administration to handle your estate. It doesn't matter if there isn't much money, someone has to get official authority to close your accounts, talk to the utilities, etc.

It's easier if you name the people you want to do this in a will, especially if you have children. You can say in a will who you would like to care for your children but the final decision would be made by Social Services.

Social Services have control over where the children live, in that it has to pass safeguarding checks. However, guardianships are about more than just living arrangements, and social services would have to have very, very strong concerns and would probably require a court order to overturn a guardian being appointed in a will. A guardian who wasn't deemed fit to care for the children --- perhaps you appointed your mother guardian when your children were babies and she was 65, but you die when they're stroppy teenagers and she's in her late seventies --- might still be perfectly capable of discharging guardianship duties in terms of decision taking.

Mojisola

securityguy wrote: »

Social Services have control over where the children live, in that it has to pass safeguarding checks. However, guardianships are about more than just living arrangements, and social services would have to have very, very strong concerns and would probably require a court order to overturn a guardian being appointed in a will.

A guardian who wasn't deemed fit to care for the children --- perhaps you appointed your mother guardian when your children were babies and she was 65, but you die when they're stroppy teenagers and she's in her late seventies --- might still be perfectly capable of discharging guardianship duties in terms of decision taking.

Of course this is right but it is still the case that you can't pass your children on in a will without it being okayed by SS.

If a resident parent said in a will that the children were to be looked after by one of his/her relatives but the children's other parent wanted them, the parent would take priority over the deceased's wishes.

securityguy

Mojisola wrote: »

Of course this is right but it is still the case that you can't pass your children on in a will without it being okayed by SS.

If a resident parent said in a will that the children were to be looked after by one of his/her relatives but the children's other parent wanted them, the parent would take priority over the deceased's wishes.

That's something of a special case, of course, because children are the equivalent of joint tenants: if one parent dies, the parental responsibility passes to anyone else who has parental responsibility, and only if that doesn't work does the issue of guardianship arises.

Your will should still, however, appoint a trustee in that case, because it would nonetheless be the case that if you had a life insurance policy, that could be left in trust for your child and their education, rather than passing unconditionally to the other parent.

In principle, children can be living with A, while B is their guardian for the purposes of parental responsibility, and C is a trustee of any money they have been left by their late parents. Social services have pretty much complete authority to override your choice of A, would find it tricky to do much about B unless there were very serious concerns, and have no control at all over C.

mjt14

Thank you for your replies.

I would like the insurance money to help with the up-bringing of my children and maybe ask that some of it be put away for when they are older - I am married so if something happens to me only he would get the money and children. But I also need to plan for all eventualities - if something happens to both of us, or if something happens to me and then him later down the line. My parents are good option to care for my children and my sister and the children's godmother will also be part of their lives (i would hope)

thorsoak

When we made our wills when our children were little, we nominated one of my sisters to be guardians of our children - and our assets (such as they were - house, death in service benefits etc) to go into a trust to cover their upbringing and with provision for receiving their shares when they each reached the age of 21 (thought 18 was too young to receive lump sums).

securityguy

mjt14, thorsoak:

You both appear to believe that death in service benefits and life insurance payments would form part of your estate, and be determined by your will. They sometimes are, but they usually aren't: usually they're written in trust, and pass directly to a named beneficiary (or sometimes at the discretion of the trustees of the scheme) without passing through the estate and without forming part of, for example, the inheritance tax calculation. If you've ever filled in an "expression of wishes" form then that overrides your will, and most workplace schemes will assume "spouse, then children" in the absence of such a form. Apart from anything else, that means that life insurance and death in service can be paid to the people who need the money before probate is proved, which can easily take a year or more.