Applying for Confirmation in Scotland

aemcl

I’m dealing with my dad’s estate on my own. His estate is over the £325k but will come under because his 3 children are left his property in his will. No tax to pay but I had to do several forms to send to HMRC before I can do the Confirmation through the Scottish court (mainly because he also had a private pension). After weeks of waiting patiently I’ve now been told by HMRC that they don’t have my paperwork and to send it all again. I know it arrived as somebody sent me back my original Power of Attorney saying it had been copied.  When I commented that I would not only suffer the wait again but would then have to give Dundee Sheriff Court a few weeks to do their bit I was told to send the Form C1 to Dundee now.   My question is:  has anyone sent the C1 form to a Scottish Sheriff Court at the same time as sending the IHT400 & schedules to HMRC?   The timeline is very clear for English estates - so many days and then they send the relevant form to Probate department. However, with a Scottish estate there are no formal timelines and you can’t get an update. This is very frustrating as I’ve already had to abandon a house sale when he passed away.   Help or advice would be appreciated. 

naedanger

I recently had to complete the IHT400 forms for an estate in Scotland where no IHT was payable.

In my case I sent the IHT400 form to HMRC and waited until I got a letter with an HMRC authorisation code in respect of the estate. I forwarded that HMRC letter to my solicitor who then submitted it and the completed C1 form to the Sheriff Court in Ayr. The Sheriff Court gave the Confirmation virtually by return of post, which was good. 

I followed this process based on my solicitor's instruction, who said the sheriff court needed HMRC authorisation before they would issue the Confirmation.

[As an aside I thought the HMRC forms had gone missing. I phoned after about 4 weeks and was told they couldn't give me any update as the forms hadn't been scanned on their system. However they told me to give it another week. When I called back in a week's time I was told the forms had been reviewed and no tax was payable. The HMRC letter arrived a few days later. ]

aemcl

Thanks for your reply. Your situation was basically what I expected to happen but I thought it had taken long enough so rang them. I was really surprised to be told I could just send the C1 form to Dundee Sheriff Court and resend the IHT forms to them by post. I’m going to take it to Dundee with the Will tomorrow because I think the worst that can happen while I wait for HMRC to start again is that they will tell me I shouldn’t have sent it.  There’s a little bit of me hopes they actually have the originals and I get a response this week but who knows.  I was told I must have sent them to the wrong address but I know I didn’t as they returned my original Power of Attorney.   

Did you get the wording on the C1 right or did the solicitor help?  By the way, dad lived in Ayr till the week before he died and I was born there too. 

naedanger

How long since you sent HMRC the forms? Until they have scanned the forms onto their system they cannot tell if they have even received them. And when I chased for an update, after about 4 weeks, I was told it could take up to 5 weeks to scan. (However if they have told you they didn't get them I expect you are at least a week or two beyond the time they are currently taking to scan the documents.)

I instructed a solicitor essentially just to complete and submit the C1 form so they did the wording. (I was happy with the numbers, inventory etc but I wasn't comfortable with the wording, particularly for the docquette, and I wasn't that keen on dealing with the sheriff court since some courts are apparently fussy and unhelpful.) If you can now go in person to the courts then I think that could help a lot.

My father was born in Ayrshire but left as an infant and only returned in his eighties having lived most of his life in the central belt. 

aemcl

It’s been just over 4 weeks but I was going with a statement I read that said they would send IHT421 (English probate) direct to the probate section within 15 days. No mention of where they would send a C1. You could well be right about the scanning issue. The lady I spoke to was just so offhand with me and insisted I had to have sent the forms to the wrong address so should resend them. Then she said to phone at the end of July and in the meantime send a copy of the C1 to Dundee. That’s got to be wrong!  Dundee have said I can deliver the paperwork in person but they won’t give advice for a big estate.  I’m sure they will reject without the HMRC code but maybe in the meantime check my wording. After your post I’m thinking I’ll give it a week before doing anything and who knows. I’ve also lodged a query with HMRC about the conflicting advice. My daughter works at home for a government department and her targets haven’t changed but COVID has caused a lot of delays. Thanks again for your help. 

Gers

naedanger said:

I recently had to complete the IHT400 forms for an estate in Scotland where no IHT was payable.

Can I ask why you had to do this?  

I'm dealing with my DM's estate confirmation and am using forms C1 and C5 with no IHT to pay? I hope I'm doing it correctly though it will be going via my solicitor just, as already said, to get the correct wording. 

naedanger

Gers said:

naedanger said:

I recently had to complete the IHT400 forms for an estate in Scotland where no IHT was payable.

Can I ask why you had to do this?  

I'm dealing with my DM's estate confirmation and am using forms C1 and C5 with no IHT to pay? I hope I'm doing it correctly though it will be going via my solicitor just, as already said, to get the correct wording. 

Not every case where there is no tax to be paid is covered by C1 and C5. 

In my case the estate's figures were along the following lines: Estate = £475k. Nil rate band £325k. Spouse's transferred nil rate band £275k (this was lower than £325k because the spouse had made some gifts prior to their death). 

Had the full spouse's nil rate been available then I could have used C1 and C5. However because the full nil rate band was not transferred (even although the allowances totalled well in excess of the estate's value) HMRC required IHT400 forms be completed.

naedanger

aemcl said:

It’s been just over 4 weeks but I was going with a statement I read that said they would send IHT421 (English probate) direct to the probate section within 15 days. No mention of where they would send a C1. You could well be right about the scanning issue. The lady I spoke to was just so offhand with me and insisted I had to have sent the forms to the wrong address so should resend them. Then she said to phone at the end of July and in the meantime send a copy of the C1 to Dundee. That’s got to be wrong!  Dundee have said I can deliver the paperwork in person but they won’t give advice for a big estate.  I’m sure they will reject without the HMRC code but maybe in the meantime check my wording. After your post I’m thinking I’ll give it a week before doing anything and who knows. I’ve also lodged a query with HMRC about the conflicting advice. My daughter works at home for a government department and her targets haven’t changed but COVID has caused a lot of delays. Thanks again for your help. 

I must admit I also think (but I could well be wrong) that the sheriff court will bounce your C1 straight back if you don't have an authorisation code from HMRC. 

As I say it took HMRC about 5 weeks before they could acknowledge receipt of my forms. But they were then very quick, I think, because the estate was clearly well below the threshold at which tax would be payable. However I would have thought HMRC timescales would have improved by now.

Gers

naedanger said:

Gers said:

naedanger said:

I recently had to complete the IHT400 forms for an estate in Scotland where no IHT was payable.

Can I ask why you had to do this?  

I'm dealing with my DM's estate confirmation and am using forms C1 and C5 with no IHT to pay? I hope I'm doing it correctly though it will be going via my solicitor just, as already said, to get the correct wording. 

Not every case where there is no tax to be paid is covered by C1 and C5. 

In my case the estate's figures were along the following lines: Estate = £475k. Nil rate band £325k. Spouse's transferred nil rate band £275k (this was lower than £325k because the spouse had made some gifts prior to their death). 

Had the full spouse's nil rate been available then I could have used C1 and C5. However because the full nil rate band was not transferred (even although the allowances totalled well in excess of the estate's value) HMRC required IHT400 forms be completed.

Thanks! I was worried for a wee while there. 

My DM's estate is around £300k so unless her flat sells for an astronomical price I'll be OK.  She did a lot of financial planning back in 2012-13 which was very forward thinking of her. 

naedanger

Gers said:

naedanger said:

Gers said:

naedanger said:

I recently had to complete the IHT400 forms for an estate in Scotland where no IHT was payable.

Can I ask why you had to do this?  

I'm dealing with my DM's estate confirmation and am using forms C1 and C5 with no IHT to pay? I hope I'm doing it correctly though it will be going via my solicitor just, as already said, to get the correct wording. 

Not every case where there is no tax to be paid is covered by C1 and C5. 

In my case the estate's figures were along the following lines: Estate = £475k. Nil rate band £325k. Spouse's transferred nil rate band £275k (this was lower than £325k because the spouse had made some gifts prior to their death). 

Had the full spouse's nil rate been available then I could have used C1 and C5. However because the full nil rate band was not transferred (even although the allowances totalled well in excess of the estate's value) HMRC required IHT400 forms be completed.

Thanks! I was worried for a wee while there. 

My DM's estate is around £300k so unless her flat sells for an astronomical price I'll be OK.  She did a lot of financial planning back in 2012-13 which was very forward thinking of her. 

Even if you have to complete the IHT400 forms they aren't difficult for a simple estate. (Very paper heavy - e.g. the personal possessions form goes on for many, many pages but you will probably find you only need to enter one figure on the whole form.)

aemcl

Sorry I didn’t answer a question on why I had to do IHT 400 etc. I started doing the C1 & C5 only but when I got to the question about a personal pension it said stop & fill in an IHT 400. Then I rang HMRC for advice and was told the same. I now believe the advice was wrong as it wasn’t a personal pension that paid anything on his death or afterwards. 

Also, I checked with Dundee Sheriff Court today about the advice to send the C1 to them while I wait for my second lot of paperwork to be processed.  The girl I spoke to checked with her supervisor and she was incredulous that I had been given that advice.  They say a lot of people are having problems.