THE Prepping thread - a new beginning :)

moneyistooshorttomention

Not been in that situation myself LLL.

But two thoughts:

1. Which Consumer Guides include one called "Wills and Probate".

2. I expect Age Concern have a guide on this. They do have guides on a lot of subjects applicable to an older age group.

There do seem to be a lot of deaths going on right now - I guess it's the time of year this tends to happen.

One of my elderly parents has just lost several siblings in a matter of weeks - which has obviously got them both thinking.:(

oceanspirit

LLL, not had to deal with this yet however Age UK do a leaflet http://www.ageuk.org.uk/Documents/EN-GB/Information-guides/AgeUKIG03_When_someone_dies.inf.pdf?epslanguage=en-GB?dtrk=true which my mother found useful when her parents died.

DigForVictory

Meantime, should you find yourself welling up a bit in anticipation, this is anticipatory grief & entirely normal just not talked about much. My sister is going through it, our parents aging steadily, & we've agreed that it's her way of mapping where her map is going to change.
That another sister is in flat denial & grouses at tears is her prerogative but a little unsupportive.
Me, I can practically recite the Age Concern leaflet by heart - I 'm a systems soul so as my parents gradually wither, I'm up for the paperwork & admin as my way of expressing love. Somehow, I've ended up with the medical research team contact numbers in my phone as they're both part of a longitudinal study on neural degeneration & thus on death someone wants to come & collect their brains. (Something they want to happen. So, my job to try to make it happen. But eep.)

Live_laugh_love

Thank you both for that I will look into it. I think I would rather be a little bit prepared rather than just blundering about! Hopefully the dreaded days are still a long way off.

moneyistooshorttomention

Not an easy situation to be in - though all of us know we can call on the experiences of many other people (as it comes to all of us at some point).

I think I get what people mean by "anticipatory grief". It's all going to vary according to the people concerned. In my case one of my parents has, to all intents and purposes, been dying for many years now - so I've long since gone through that I think and just want them not to be suffering any longer. The parent concerned has an absolute "will of iron" and has been using it - because of not wanting to go just yet - but I can see they are very very tired, as well as incredibly ill:(

Karmacat

Good heavens ... I'm just returning to mse after a four week break because my elderly mum just died. I'm glad I clicked on the thread. Hopefully the following will be of use:

The first thing is to get a doctor in to certify death, then you register it with the registrar. Expect a phone call to check up on the doctor - this is post-Harold Shipman! You also need a funeral director, probably.

The Registrar should tell you about the government's Tell Us Once service - it's good, but it doesn't cover everything, not quite, you have to check.

If the wills you mention are lodged with a solicitor, do your elderly rellies have photocopies? Who are the executors? Extracting a will from a solicitor was simple after a family bereavement in 2009, but last month it was horrendous - we needed a photo ID and two proofs of residence for each executor. Awful, if you live far away from the scene, as me and my sister both do.

Do your rellies know what they want to happen to their bodies after death? Sorry it sounds gruesome ... we knew my mum wanted to be cremated, and for her ashes to go with my dad's, on his brother's grave.

You'll need some executor ID for each financial concern, whether pension income, savings, or outgoing bills. None of them were as bad as the local solicitor though.

Probate - informing organisations is only the first step, if they're satisfied with your information, they send a form for you to fill in, you send it back (with a death cert? I think so, we're not there yet, so I can't tell you from experience) and *then* you get a value as of death date. You don't get money till after probate is granted, and as bank accounts are frozen, you need to open an "estate of" bank account if the house is owned and has direct debits that need taking care of.

Some organisations are good, some are terrible. The Halifax was utterly terrible, they should be ashamed of themselves, and weirdly John Lewis credit card wasn't much better. My mum's solicitor will spend time in purgatory atoning for their supercilious attitude towards us, the funeral director will hopefully learn to use a spell checker.

Keep notes! In a single diary format, or with each file. It's essential.

Hope this helps. It's a bit bald, I know, sorry, but these are my experiences right now.

greenbee

I still haven't had a final statement from John Lewis credit card Karmacat, although they've asked me to settle the account... I've told them I can't until I've seen the statement, so we'll see what happens.

We're currently trying to work out what we're going to do and what we want the solicitor to do - although most of it is straightforward, it's a question of having the time available to get it done. If the solicitor doesn't get their act together I may just have to take some time off work and stay with my mum to deal with the outstanding stuff. But one of the reasons I handed the rest of it over to the solicitor was because of the appalling lack of any clear process from a number of places that we were dealing with.

Life insurance were great. Barclays were great. Some of the other banks and insurance companies were less so - no process, no forms - 'send us a certificate/certified copy of the will/grant of probate with a covering letter'. Does anyone REALLY feel up to writing a covering letter in these circumstances. Forms I can fill in. Letters I can't do.

fuddle

I'm 3 months down the road of sorting through my mam's probate myself LLL. I had no clue what to do. The path opens as you wander down it LLL. Everything falls into place because one thing can't be done without the other.

Being prepared has it's uses, absolutely, but don't be thinking that you need to be for this ok? It can be done, and done well, without any prior knowledge. My advice would be, when the times comes, is just be organised.

Sorry Karmacat I have to disagree about the bank account. It is only frozen if over the threshold. We had access to and were given the contents of mam's account into our own accounts in order to pay for the funeral and probate process. This was within the first week before I even sniffed at probate.

It's so difficult to explain the process because every one is different. But honestly, it's nothing to worry about.

Live_laugh_love

Thank you every one, think I will bite the bullet and ask each parent what their funeral wishes are, where the wills are kept and where they keep all the important paperwork stuff, then write it all down.
In actual fact,think I'll do that for me and Hubs as well and give it to my eldest, coz you just never know what's next up in life!

DigForVictory

Yes, including offspring in sorting your parents estate will be very helpful experience for them in their turn. Lumpy, but useful. Plus all the questions, which Need to be asked, have better odds.

Hm. Do I drag a grandchild (or three) along to the paperwork sessions with snivelling and snarling aunts or pretend we're all grownup really...?