Help with Money Owed To Estate

JS89

Good morning everyone,

My father passed away on March last year and we appointed a solicitor to take care of his estate. My sister was the executor and I was authorized to speak to the solicitors on her behalf.  

We found out that he loaned a his friends (A couple) £16,000, we found the written, signed and dated agreement in with his documents.

The solicitor said that they wouldn't be able to chase for this money unless we paid them £300 per letter, something that we where not willing to do as they advised that due to them not in employment the chances of recouping the money was slim. Additionally, this solicitor has sent us virtually no documents at all, they didn't show us any bank statements, only sending us s statement of account at the end which showed what wen't in and out of the estate.  

My late father also paid a deposit on a driveway in November 2019, with the work due to start on 20th Feb. As he was in hospital from 5th Jan and passed away on the 20th March, the guy who was paid the deposit never started the work or got in contact with my dad to ask what's going on. Again, I have a copy of the invoice and confirmation he paid the £900 deposit, again - the solicitor said we wouldn't be able to recoup this money. 

In the end we where charged £5,400 fee's on an estate that was only worth £28,000. So I want to make sure they did everything right. I wondered if I should go back t them and ask for all the documents (copies of bank statements etc) as we don't know much of the £16,000 has been repair and what's outstanding.

Many thanks in advance and sorry for rambling on, it's something that has been bothering me for a while!

MEM62

Your mistake was to appoint a solicitor to handle things when you could have done so perfectly well yourself.  The state was not complicated enough to require legal counsel.  The estate has a perfect right to pursue the 'friends' for the debt and may resort to litigation if need be.  As for the deposit for the driveway, whether this is recoverable or not will depend on the terms and conditions that your father agreed to when ordering the work.    

Keep_pedalling

The the big lesson here is that for most estates, and certainly simple estates like this, do not need a solicitor. It just costs money and takes longer.

There is nothing stopping your sister chasing these debts herself. The loan to friends could be pursued through the small claims court, but if they are skint and don’t own property it might not be worth doing.

The same with the driveway, your sister should write to the firm requesting a return of the deposit. If it is not forthcoming, then she should send a letter before action, then file a claim to get it back.

https://www.gov.uk/make-court-claim-for-money

JS89

Thank you for your reply.

The issue is we don't know much much they have paid towards the £16,000 loan (Re-payment was agreed at £500 a month), as the solicitor has not told us this, it feels like this was held back with the hope of us using them at £300 + VAT a letter! 

The driveway company (Self employed bloke) did tell me and the solicitor that he would pay but he has gone quiet since I threatened him with court. I don't want to pay the £70 court fee and find out we can't re-coup the deposit. FYI, the deposit of £900 was paid into his personal account. 

Thank you very much for your help with this.

RAS

Write formally to the driveway company, reminding him that he agreed to return the deposit and give him a deadline. Since your sister is the executor, she needs to do it.

At this point threatening court may just upset him, accusing him of bad faith before he had the opportunity demonstrate otherwise.  

However if he doesn't pay then a letter before action would be needed (deadline before you go to court). He probably doesn't want or need a CCJ wrecking his business, so use MCOL if he's unresponsive.

And if the CCJ doesn't work, report him to Trading Standards. Won't get your deposit back but might stop him in the future.

JS89

I'll do that and get my sister to write a LBA, although I have asked her to contact the solicitor requesting documents but she hasn't done it.. Too busy is her response!.

FYI, the solicitor took 12 months to finally pay out, yes me and my two sisters did get an interim payment but they only finalized and made the final payment to us when we made a formal complaint. 

Flugelhorn

you need to get the bank statements and see whether there are any loan payments listed

Solicitors do take longer than people doing probate themselves - a year is not unsual.

Keep_pedalling

JS89 said:

Thank you for your reply.

The issue is we don't know much much they have paid towards the £16,000 loan (Re-payment was agreed at £500 a month), as the solicitor has not told us this, it feels like this was held back with the hope of us using them at £300 + VAT a letter! 

The driveway company (Self employed bloke) did tell me and the solicitor that he would pay but he has gone quiet since I threatened him with court. I don't want to pay the £70 court fee and find out we can't re-coup the deposit. FYI, the deposit of £900 was paid into his personal account. 

Thank you very much for your help with this.

Unless the solicitor had access to his bank statements going back over the years since the loan he would not have a clue how much was paid back. You sister can speak to his bank’s bereavement department about obtaining the statements. 

JS89

My sister went into the bank the day after he died and as soon as she told them he had died they froze the account, so we didn't have a chance to request statements, although surely the solicitor should have requested this to find out how much was left? My sister said she has a feeling it's around £9k from what the solicitor told her. 

Keep_pedalling

JS89 said:

My sister went into the bank the day after he died and as soon as she told them he had died they froze the account, so we didn't have a chance to request statements, although surely the solicitor should have requested this to find out how much was left? My sister said she has a feeling it's around £9k from what the solicitor told her. 

How much was left in the account won’t help with historical payments into it, for that you need past statements which will be available if your sister asked for them.

With such a small estate the bank would have given the executor the contents of the estate without the need to apply for probate. A bit late for you but for anyone else reading this it might be helpful to know appointing a solicitor should not be the first thing an executor thinks of doing.

MEM62

JS89 said:

My sister went into the bank the day after he died and as soon as she told them he had died they froze the account, so we didn't have a chance to request statements,

Freezing the account does not delete all the historical data. The statements should still be available.