Opening a savings account which requires 3 signatories

londonlisa72

Hi, I need to open up a savings account for my 17 year old son (but not in his name) on his behalf as he has inherited a lump sum from the death of his father. My solicitor has stipulated that because my son is under 18 a bank account/savings account needs to be opened up until he is of age to access the funds himself. The account needs to have 3 signatories on it - being myself plus the 2 administrators of the estate in order to protect my son's inheritance. I have obviously done some research myself but there are so many choices out there. Does anyone have advice on which bank/building society etc would be most suitable? 

Archi_Bald

You might get lucky with a local building society, or with a trust account.

How much money is involved? Could £9K be put into a JISA? It wouldn't require any signatories but the money would be your son's and not accessible until he is 18.

Why do you have to find and open the account? Isn't that the job of the executor?

xylophone

Your son is seventeen years old and it is less than a year until he  has the legal right to access and control.
It might well be possible to open an account in Trust with NS&I for that period.
https://www.nsandi.com/how-do-i-manage-accounts-other-people

londonlisa72

Thank you. The amount is between £50-£100k - I don't have the final figure as yet. It has been an extremely complicated 4 and half years of Probate and we have now come to the final hurdle. There isn't an executor of the estate per se, instead my son's 2 older half sisters are the administrators and I am looking after my son's interests as his 'litigation friend' signed off by the Court. Our solicitor has left it up to us (me!) to open the account with all 3 signatures attached to it.

Malthusian

"Executors" and "administrators" can be used interchangably as they have pretty much identical duties once the process kicks off. (For those not familiar with the process, if you leave a Will your estate will have executors and if you don't bother your estate will have administrators.)

There is no need for the administrators to be signatories for the account, that's just adding pointless complication. You open the account as his Trustee, give the details to the administrators, they pay the money in, job done. Their job is to pay him the money, it is not their job to look after it until he is 18.

Alternatively, wouldn't it be easier to just wait until he is 18 and then pay it into his own bank account? The estate's taken 4 and a half years to wind up, what's another few months?