Joint Names

Hitting

Would it be advantageous to have accounts/billing in joint names to make things easier,less urgent to attend to in the event of death of spouse.Currently I have a number of regular billing arrangements in my sole name,...such as Energy bills,Water rates,Council tax,House insurance,etc.......would it help if I amended these to joint accounts?
I realise the organisations involved would need to be informed if one joint holder passed away,but presumably this would not need to be done immediately on death?

The_Last_Username

Someone with experience and knowledge may be better-placed than I to advise appropriately, but here are my thoughts.

FWIW it's not only death of a spouse that needs to be considered; long-term illness or loss of faculties are just two examples of further reasons why the person may not be able to appropriately manage their affairs.

In my experience companies will not (and indeed often have told me that legally they cannot) in any way discuss an account with anyone other than the account holder.
It may therefore be expedient to have all accounts wherever possible in joint names.

Primrose

It might help in some cases but some accounts like gas, electricity, water may only allow an account to be opened in one name and if the deceased spouse is the account holder a new account will have to be set up in the name of the survivor. I discovered this when a I wanted to have joint utility bills to use as identity/address verification for money laundering purposes when opening new savings accounts . joint bank accounts can generally continue operating on the death of one signatory. Obviously this should never be regarded as an easy alternative to having a proper will.but setting up direct debits for utilities on a joint account does make administration easier for the survivor.

The other thing, if all your affairs are generally dealt with online is to print off the occasional paper copy of a bill and keep it filed so that the surviving spouse has a paper record of utility address, account number, etc without online searching to know who to sort to sort out any administration.

Primrose

And another thing to consider in the case of debilitating illness of one partner rather than death, especially if accounts arn't in joint names is to set up Financial and Property apowers of Attorney for each other. With possibly another attorney in case you are both hurt together in a car accident or something and can't act for each other. If you're not familiar with these read up about them on the office of Public Guardian website. You don't need to go through a solicitor. Yiu can complete these forms yourself online on the website. Yiu just have to read the instructions carefully and ensure the forms are signed, witnessed and dated in the correct order.

Hitting

I think the advice I'm getting is that where possible it is advantageous to have joint arrangements!

CIS

Hitting wrote: »

Would it be advantageous to have accounts/billing in joint names to make things easier,less urgent to attend to in the event of death of spouse.Currently I have a number of regular billing arrangements in my sole name,...such as Energy bills,Water rates,Council tax,House insurance,etc.......would it help if I amended these to joint accounts?
I realise the organisations involved would need to be informed if one joint holder passed away,but presumably this would not need to be done immediately on death?

If you have a resident spouse or partner then they should already be listed on the council tax demand as being jointly liable as per legislation (with a few exceptions)

Craig