Probate and IHT

petethesteam

I hope someone can HELP. I am helping my brother complete the probate and IHT on his recently deceased wife. It appears from a lot of loose paperwork that she has that there may be 2 or 3 bank/saving accounts, lots of premium bonds and loads is different shares. My brother is executor of the will and we are currently filling in probate forms and the IHT online service. The problem we are encountering is that in order to fill in the IHT form we need the info from all financial institutions that we have found whom mostly require the grant of probate to release the info we need to fill in the IHT, but the probate form asks for the value of the estate and reference from the IHT form......so we are stuck...can’t complete either without them both being completed...we have idea how much the estate is worth...what the hell do we do...
please help.:(:(:huh:

eddyinfreehold

Hi Pete

My sympathies for your family's recent loss. You don't need a copy of the Grant of Probate to obtain this information. I was in a similar position about 18 months ago. You need a copy of the death certificate, or the interim death certificate.

A short letter to each of the institutions will suffice, enclosing a copy of the death certificate. Inform them of the death of your sister in law, the date of death, correspondence address and executor's or solicitor's name and simply request a statement of all holdings in the organisation at the time of death. It is a two line letter. You should get responses within 2-4 weeks for them all. As for National Savings you can fill in a form to request details of all NI&S investments in one go, including Premium Bonds. I hope this helps.

When, and only when you have got all their replys can you consider filling in the IHT forms for HMRC. Then after that you can apply for a Grant of Probate. Hope this helps...

Tom99

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]That should not be the case since you cannot get probate until you know all the assets.
[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]A bank or share platform should release the information you need on production of the death certificate and maybe, if there is one, the will.

[/FONT] [FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]If you are really stuck you can apply for probate using estimated figures which are marked as such on the IT form. Explain in the notes why you have had to do that.

[/FONT] [FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Then at a later date you can update IT office with the correct figures.[/FONT]

Linton

Assuming your brother is the executor he will need to tell the institutions that their customer has died. They should have a standard process for managing this and probably will want to see a copy of the death certificate and less commonly will want to see the will to ensure that your brother really is the executor.

Once they are formally aware of the situation there should be no problem getting the information. If the money held is significant it won’t be released until probate has been granted.

Uxb

Linton wrote: »

If the money held is significant it won’t be released until probate has been granted.

...and of course that is where the trouble arises
If the estate is significant IHT will be payable.
Probate will not be granted until the Inland Revenue have been paid the IHT (that due on property is allowed to be paid off in later installments subject to a large interest bill on any delay)
You as executor do not have the funds to pay the IHT until the funds from the estate's monetary holdings have been released.
These monies will not be released by financial groups to the executor until probate has been granted......

Rinse and repeat for as long as you wish.

Linton

Uxb wrote: »

...and of course that is where the trouble arises
If the estate is significant IHT will be payable.
Probate will not be granted until the Inland Revenue have been paid the IHT (that due on property is allowed to be paid off in later installments subject to a large interest bill on any delay)
You as executor do not have the funds to pay the IHT until the funds from the estate's monetary holdings have been released.
These monies will not be released by financial groups to the executor until probate has been granted......

Rinse and repeat for as long as you wish.

Ask the bank to pay HMRC.

getmore4less

Uxb wrote: »

...and of course that is where the trouble arises
If the estate is significant IHT will be payable.
Probate will not be granted until the Inland Revenue have been paid the IHT (that due on property is allowed to be paid off in later installments subject to a large interest bill on any delay)
You as executor do not have the funds to pay the IHT until the funds from the estate's monetary holdings have been released.
These monies will not be released by financial groups to the executor until probate has been granted......

Rinse and repeat for as long as you wish.

Most estates even large ones don't have a problem either exemptions(eg spouse) or property are involved so can be paid in installments.

Uxb

Linton wrote: »

Ask the bank to pay HMRC.

Well in a way you are sort of correct.
My sad few experiences is that the only way to do it is to take out a bank loan in the name of the executors to pay off the IHT which is then indeed paid by the bank to the Inland Revenue.

There has never been anything like the amount of money in the bank of the deceased's that I have had any dealings with/lending assistance to pay the IHT....which was I admit some time ago and possibly the rules for direct payment from other sources might have been eased by now to get round this quandary.

Then once probate is granted and the investments can be sold and the proceeds of these can then be used to pay off the bank loan.
Finally the estate accounts gets charged with the cost of the bank loan thereby reducing the net payout to the residual beneficiaries.

Yorkshireman99

petethesteam wrote: »

I hope someone can HELP. I am helping my brother complete the probate and IHT on his recently deceased wife. It appears from a lot of loose paperwork that she has that there may be 2 or 3 bank/saving accounts, lots of premium bonds and loads is different shares. My brother is executor of the will and we are currently filling in probate forms and the IHT online service. The problem we are encountering is that in order to fill in the IHT form we need the info from all financial institutions that we have found whom mostly require the grant of probate to release the info we need to fill in the IHT, but the probate form asks for the value of the estate and reference from the IHT form......so we are stuck...can’t complete either without them both being completed...we have idea how much the estate is worth...what the hell do we do...
please help.:(:(:huh:

Who are the beneficiaries? if the main part of the estate goes to the spouse then there will not be any IHT.

Linton

Uxb wrote: »

Well in a way you are sort of correct.
My sad few experiences is that the only way to do it is to take out a bank loan in the name of the executors to pay off the IHT which is then indeed paid by the bank to the Inland Revenue.

There has never been anything like the amount of money in the bank of the deceased's that I have had any dealings with/lending assistance to pay the IHT....which was I admit some time ago and possibly the rules for direct payment from other sources might have been eased by now to get round this quandary.

Then once probate is granted and the investments can be sold and the proceeds of these can then be used to pay off the bank loan.
Finally the estate accounts gets charged with the cost of the bank loan thereby reducing the net payout to the residual beneficiaries.

You were talking about "monetary holdings". When I was executor there was sufficient money in the deceased's bank accounts which was used to pay HMRC prior to probate. Assets such as shares or old masters would present more of a problem.

NordicNoir

Uxb wrote: »

Well in a way you are sort of correct.
My sad few experiences is that the only way to do it is to take out a bank loan in the name of the executors to pay off the IHT.....
Then once probate is granted and the investments can be sold and the proceeds of these can then be used to pay off the bank loan.

Many brokers will also allow the sale of investments to be used specifically to pay the IHT. They will demand that they pay the funds directly to HMRC though and only sell the amount required to cover the IHT. I know that Hargreaves Lansdown provide this service.