Question re stealing money from account after death?

McKneff

Dear God, have we really come to this that we will steal and lie and whatever it takes to amass a few quid....


Morals are becoming a thing of the past......


Karma guys, Karma rules..... eventually......

Torry_Quine

I have very mixed feelings about this. Legally yes the partner has stolen from your mother but it seems strange that you parents were no longer together but your mother and father still had a joint account.

Who is actually named to inherit the estate and is there much to inherit, remembering that the money in the joint account is seperate?

Final thought, what are you trustee of?

System

From the point of death - the contents of joint account become the sole property of the surviving account holder.

Your late dad's partner took the money from the surviving account holder (i.e. your Mother) without permission.

People do things (and don't do) things for a variety of reasons. IMHO It's very telling that he retained and used a joint account with your Mum along with not getting divorced etc

Steve_xx

Heng_Leng wrote: »

From the point of death - the contents of joint account become the sole property of the surviving account holder.

Your late dad's partner took the money from the surviving account holder (i.e. your Mother) without permission.

People do things (and don't do) things for a variety of reasons. IMHO It's very telling that he retained and used a joint account with your Mum along with not getting divorced etc

Yes I agree. It's theft as far as the law is concerned. Often on here we have a tendency to digress into side issues that are unrelated to the question originally posed.

antrobus

weemck85 wrote: »

....The bank are saying they will pass it to their fraud team to investigate and we should hear back shortly, but can anyone tell me the odds of re-couping all of the money? ...

Depends.

It's a Payment Services Regulations 2009 question. The bank is liable for an unauthorised payment transaction (reg 61); the payer's liability is limited to £50 where they have failed to keep the 'personalised security features' safe (reg 62).

However the bank might argue that the payer had been 'grossly negligent' in failing to comply with the t&cs of the account and was therefore liable for the losses themselves.

You can always (of course) complain to the FOS if you don't get the result you want, and the executor can always take civil legal action for recovery against the individual concerned.

FireWyrm

Sod the bank, report it to the police as theft and press charges.

Larry123

I think both aspects of this have been sufficiently discussed. The two ways of looking at it are from the legal perspective and the moral perspective. There are many questions to the moral perspective that we (anyone outside of the family) cannot answer and can only speculate. It is now for OP to consider what has been said and to draw a conclusion as to what should be done next. Communication is the key, god only knows I wish we had more if it in our family when it came to money.

I am sorry to here about your father.

kidmugsy

bouicca21 wrote: »

Am I the only person who feels that the partner might be justified in using this money?

It would be nice to think you were. Do you approve of all theft?

Longships

Who is arranging and paying for the funeral? Could this woman who was his partner after all may be using the money for that?

Steve_xx

Longships wrote: »

Who is arranging and paying for the funeral? Could this woman who was his partner after all may be using the money for that?

You're speculating about all sorts of scenarios here. It really is better to answer the original poster's query factually rather than getting involved in side issues that have not been put to anyone here for clarification on.

The factual answer is that there has on the face of it been a theft. That is a criminal act for which statute dictates that the police are bound to take action on.