Wills/Probate and Inheritance Tax

Tigerlilykiss16

Hi

So We've received a response from HMRC via out solicitor. It is far from satisfactory and the response has come from Mike Howe of Business Tax Operations!! And as his title would suggest he appears to know very little about IHT. He has chosen to hide behind the Data Protection and has not addressed the questions raised regarding turnaround times.

I can confirm that IHT400 is currently on an 11 week turnaround for anyone who is waiting for this.

Needless to say we will be responding to Mr Howe's letter via our MP. We have now waited in excess of 8 months for confirmation that all tax has been settled (IHT300).

I will advise any progress.

ECYF

It's frustrating HMRC are understaffed and have such long turnaround times. If this was the whole process it would be OK, but there's no much more involved in Probate that it makes the whole process so much more arduous.

As there is a Law firm handling this, I don't think our local MP could help.

I hope your troublesome journey comes to an end soon.

securityguy

ECYF wrote: »

We are not pleased with the way the firm has handled the estate at all. The first meeting with the person in charge of doing it was not promising, when he referred to himself as a Solicitor, when he is in fact a Probate Executive.

It is a criminal offence for someone to call themselves a solicitor or act as a solicitor if they are not on the roll of solicitors. We call these people "bogus solicitors" and we may prosecute them.

http://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/fraud-dishonesty/bogus-fake-solicitors.page

ECYF

The person handling the estate is not a solicitor himself, but he workds for a solicitors firm. He made the reference in person, not in writing, so nothing could really come of it. We would of course include this in any complaint.