deed of variation? 30 October 2015 at 10:59PM edited 30 November -1 at 1:00AM in Deaths, Funerals & Probate 135 replies 21.5K views

Anthear

I know exactly how you feel. There is a certain arrogance amongst certain individuals/firms in the legal profession. They appear to have absolutely no shame.

Hope you are getting closer to a resolution. If it's any consolation, a relative of mine died in Oct 2014 and the estate administration has STILL not been completed - the Executor is a firm of Solicitors. I think as a whole the industry works very slowly as it's in their interests, they don't seem to feel any pressure of time and they do things in a linear format - ie one thing after another rather than concurrently. Takes bloody forever and they pay a tiny amount of interest on the money they hold to add further insult to injury so all the while the money is worth less and less...... makes me soooooo cross.

orwen

Some probably smaller firms seem ok, some firms, probably the larger ones, are atrocious - this firm sits on correspondence for days on end then appears to factor the days of sitting into their costs, the longer they can draw everything out, the longer is the bill they present you with. It is a confidence trick and I rue the day I was recommended to these people, they have achieved precisely nothing with regard to the dispute. Every time I asked them what the state of play was, seeing that all the opportunities for the opposing side to launch a case have expired - all they'd say was 'We cannot say what their next move will be', when it was patently obvious even to a lay person like me that there were no more moves left for them to make, apart from firing off meaningless solicitors' letters at my solicitor to keep the dispute broiling. The dispute will never be resolved because the other side took umbrage at my mother's will, there's nothing I can do about that and I will never, ever vary my mother's final wishes - not for the other side or for anybody else. Mum's will is sacred as far as I am concerned, I was shocked to learn how glib some solicitors are about varying people's wills as if the people who made them were of no concern because no longer in the land of the living. That is such an unbelievable insult to the memory of those who have passed on. You got it right when you mentioned 'no shame' among some of these people, they have about as much conscience as a reptile. :shocked:

securityguy

So why didn't you simply sack the solicitors and distribute the estate? Yes, they appear to have behaved appallingly. But all you had to do was write to them and say "you no longer represent me, please forward me your invoice for my consideration". Yes, I know you have some byplay about them somehow "holding" your house deeds, but they can't do that, as the shortest trip to the SRA would reveal.

orwen

Well, in a sense, isn't that what I just did? They are off the case now - a case which never existed in the first place. My initial solicitor's underpants changed colour when they thought they were going to end up in court defending their professionalism - the will they drew up for my late mother - so I ended up with these sharks instead. Solicitors! :mad:

Anthear

I wouldn't pay them personally. Well done for seeing through the façade. Almost as bad as Estate Agents???