Death. Small estate..what next

DonnaDucky

Hi
This is my first time posting so sorry if i have made a mistake.
I cannot seem to find information needed.

Mother passed away(father already passed)
Small estate (under £15000) in Scotland
Family happy for me to do everything,as i was before parents death..money will be divided between siblings.

Reading other sites it says that i do not need to do confirmation if estate under £36000.

Im just a bit confused. ..what do i need to do, lol

All money is collected in bank now in my name, so have total access to it.
Pension and pension credit stopped, with the dwp asking for some small overpayment to be paid back.which will be done tomorrow.

It seems like there should be something else i should do , lol

Also if i pay out money to siblings, how do i protect myself from having to pay monies if further down line dwp says more money needs to be paid back etc.

Thanks and hope i have explained myself

Margot123

I can't help you with Scottish confirmation but you might change your post's title to include the word 'Scotland'. That should grab the attention of those who are au fait with Scottish procedure.

badmemory

If you have been managing her affairs for some time then you will most probably be aware of any debts, so that won't be a problem. You are already dealing with the normal DWP overpayment (including attendance allowance?), this just leaves you with any means tested benefit such as pension credit. It tends to be those which cause the problems when a claimant's savings have risen above the savings limit which I think is £10k.

Keep_pedalling

Later claims from the DWP are triggered by probate / confirmation being granted as this is the point the value of the estate becomes a public record.

In this case that will never happen as you don!!!8217;t need confirmation. If you want to play safe you could do an interim payment and keep some back just in case

Yorkshireman99

Keep_pedalling wrote: »

Later claims from the DWP are triggered by probate / confirmation being granted as this is the point the value of the estate becomes a public record.

In this case that will never happen as you don!!!8217;t need confirmation. If you want to play safe you could do an interim payment and keep some back just in case

The OP should have notified the DWP of the death or used the Tell Us Once service.

badmemory

Yorkshireman99 wrote: »

The OP should have notified the DWP of the death or used the Tell Us Once service.

This is what may well have triggered the overpayment the OP is dealing with. But she needs to be sure that any means tested benefit has had her mother's savings taken into account, otherwise a much later claim could arise. I'm not sure how these accounts may be involved now the banks have to report accounts to HMRC.

Keep_pedalling

PC is a bit of a complicated one. If the OPs mother was on it and was into her 80s then she almost certainly would have been on an indefinite assessed income period, which would have meant it could still be claimed if she won £10M on the lottery.

Any overpayment would be based on savings held at the date the last income assessment was carried out, not those held at the time of death, which is why we sometimes see posts where executors have been asked to provide bank statements going back more years than is possible to get.

YoungBlueEyes

An interim payment is a good idea, or perhaps don't pay out til you're sure there is nothing more to come into or pay out from the estate (pensions or taxman or whoever). A 6 month gap would be reasonable.