Halifax and Bereavement

sharonhorton

My father recently passed away ,he had an account with Halifax.

So rather then sort my dad‘s estate and bank accounts over the phone I thought it be better to go into the bank and do it face-to-face.
The lady in the bank Hold me that’s sorting my fathers bank accounts can only be don online or over the phone.

 so she called the bereavement department of Halifax. 

The gentleman I spoke to explained how Halifax had  changed the way they help people with bereavement . 

by Making it quicker easier and less hard on the family that are dealing with the estate. 

It started off very well, the gentleman told me and my husband it would take up to 30 days to transfer my fathers accounts across to myself. So rather than ask The bank if they could pay for my dad’s funeral out of the money that was in his account . Myself and husband decided to pay for it out of our overdraft and credit cards as we was assured it was only going to take up to 30 days .

After 30 days we still had not received anything from Halifax. so I decided to called the Bereavement department again, i was then informed it would be up to 30 working days not up to 30 days. 

What I really don’t understand is it’s now the 14th of April the money in my fathers account was transferred and the account closed on the 6th of April so where is the money.

Why has it not been transferred . It seems that the bank is holding on to my father’s money as long as possible .to get as much interest as possible .

All I want  do is sort my fathers estate out .so I can finish my grieving knowing everything is paid and try the best to get on with it my life.

To me it just seems that the bank is not letting the money go .until its exactly 30 days i,and as it’s now Easter, it’s going to be even longer.

don’t understand a Halifax can say this is easier process for the family and people left behind.

Brie

Ring them up and say that you need to lodge a complaint about the inaccurate information you have been given and specifically that you have now experienced a financially disadvantage due to this inaccurate info.

At a minimum you should get an apology.  You may also get some action and a bit on compensation.

Do not agree to drop the complaint until the money is transferred and you are happy with their response.

msb1234

Sadly, by doing what you thought was the right thing to do in paying for your dad’s funeral, you’ve done precisely the wrong thing. If you had sent the bank the invoices for the funeral, they would have paid them directly to the funeral director out of the account. 

The bank account would have been frozen as soon as they were notified of your father’s death. I assume you took in your fathers will and gave them proof of your identity etc? I know I had to give my passport details, proof of address, copies of the will and death certificate. 

sharonhorton

Yes! I give them all the proof and documentation they re-quested ,when I went into the bank on the 8th March .

I only found out that I had the option to take some money from my dads Account to help with the funeral costs a couple of day after i had been in the bank ,to let them know about my dad .
And then I just thought that I will wait for the up to 30 days .

And while I was in Halifax I was not informed this was an option or otherwise I would’ve sorted it on that day.

It’s my mistake I should’ve looked into it more .but this is the first time that I’ve had to deal with dealing with anybody’s Estate .plus sorting my dads account, funeral and letting everyone no about my dad has been left to me to sort out ,and it’s a struggle .

Mrs_Z

I found Halifax relatively easy to deal with.  Certainly for uploading documents it was easy to do through a link they sent me and generally, there was no difficulty in getting through to speak to someone.  That said, I am currently/still waiting for them to release the funds - the request was sent about a month ago with documents etc.  They did not ask for a proof of probate - nor Executor ship (ie. copy of the will) which I thought was very strange - just the death certificate and my ID was sufficient, but maybe because the total in question is below £50,000.
That said, I have heard nothing further from them, if I recall correctly, the lady said over the phone that it would take 4-5 weeks.
Rightly or wrongly, I had foreseen that the account would be frozen and as I had a Power of Attorney, I transferred a smallish sum to a different account to pay for the cremation, funeral farewell, probate application and advertisement at the Gazette before informing the bank of the person's passing.  I'm very pleased I did, the time between the person's death and funeral was very distressing and hectic and the last thing I needed was to go begging to the bank for them to pay the funeral bill. 

Savvy_Sue

Mrs_Z said:

Rightly or wrongly, I had foreseen that the account would be frozen and as I had a Power of Attorney, I transferred a smallish sum to a different account to pay for the cremation, funeral farewell, probate application and advertisement at the Gazette before informing the bank of the person's passing.  I'm very pleased I did, the time between the person's death and funeral was very distressing and hectic and the last thing I needed was to go begging to the bank for them to pay the funeral bill. 

Just for future reference (ie anyone reading this in the future), it really isn't a case of going begging to the bank: if you make the Funeral Director aware that the bill needs to be settled by the bank, then that's what should happen, without your involvement.