Bank need meeting to transfer money?

Daliah

kaMelo said:

There were many ways to achieve what she wanted such as a discretionary trust and given you state in your OP that the inheritance and transfer was done with a solicitor involved I'm surprised this wasn't discussed at the time along with tax implications such as income tax liability for her on the savings interest in her sons name.  I would suggest  getting all the paperwork together to find out exactly what happened before doing anything.

Someone who is in deep depression because they think they are terminally ill can't really be blamed for making rash and uninformed decisions, in an effort to ensure their young child's financial future. However, it seems astonishing that Halifax was happy to have hundreds of thousands land in a children's savings account which would pay abysmal interest, and which isn't fully FSCS protected. Total dereliction of duty on their part. And what the hell was the solicitor thinking who administered the payment?!? (scratch that after a further update by the OP). May be this is at least part of the reason why they keep postponing a meeting. OP, please get a solicitor (a different one this time). Or at a minimum, go to Citizens Advice. Don't do this again without professional, independent, guidance.

Ergates said:

Regarding the HMRC - If the intention was for your wife to retain ownership of the money, then any interest earned on the money should have been counted against her as income for taxation purposes.   Presumably though, if your wife has been unwell she may not have been working?  If that is the case then the tax implication might be simplified - as her annual income, including the interest, may still have been below the minimum threshold of £12570.

If she wasn't working and had no other taxable income, she / her child could have got up to £17,570 tax free, as the savings starting rate would have applied. However, I don't believe the interest would have been anything like that - -  have a look at Halifax kids savings accounts, their interest rates are so low they might as well not exist at all. Whatever the interest was, it was Halifax's responsibility to report the interest payments to HMRC, and HMRC's responsibility to chase the mother for any tax that might have become due. Since the latter doesn't appear to have happened, it seems rather likely that the interest payments were peanuts. In any event, I don't believe the mother needs to be worried about anything to do with the HMRC. But as per above, she should not try to resolve the matter without independent professional support.

CaptWreck

Thank you all for your updates. I have spoken to the wife and I can clarify a few more things of relevance and respond to a few comments myself. 

1. When the money was moved i was not married to my wife. 

2. The money went from a solicitor into my wife’s bank (with her own moderate savings) and had been there for a few months. She has realised her own mortality and then transferred 95% of this money (coming to about £800k) into a child account (not isa, just a child’s current account thing)
3. The transfer between her account and the child’s there was no paper work or forms or declarations signed she is aware of. 

4. I will add, my wife has had a very long and complex battle with mental health and has on occasions acted impulsively and out of panic and fear such as this occasion. She has come along way herself however if I’m honest, I would question her competency at the time of making the transfer. So she defiantly would not have thought about implications or tax or HMRC or automatic inheritance rules etc anyway. 

5. I love my wife dearly and we are trying to make/find ways to help her do less “ostriching” as we call it whenever there is a problem. This is why we’ve worked on me being more involved to help stop her making rash decisions. 

And finally, to people messaging me about me doing a horrible thing stealing from a child’s and my wife, you have no place. Whilst I do not feel the need to listen to hateful comments, I will be clear and in no uncertain terms state that this money will be used for the benefit of the boy. It’s a complicated issue but the boy and my wife both suffered DV (and other very horrible acts and crimes upon them) by the boys biological father who is now well out of the picture. We want to leave the town and memories behind us. The boy wants to move out of the flat, get a garden with a trampoline and a new school. We agree. The boy regresses and has nightmares whenever he sees or bumps into his biological dads family. It’s truest heartbreaking and all my family needs is a fresh start. 

Daliah

CaptWreck said:

And finally, to people messaging me about me doing a horrible thing stealing from a child’s and my wife, you have no place.

Report them.

born_again

Brie said:

Give them a deadline to hold the meeting or move your money.  

Give them a deadline yes. But without the meeting Halifax will block any money movement. Even if a complaint was raised & it went to FOS. FOS would back Halifax on the block. As they have a duty of care to the customer, who in this case is only 5. 
Yes they would get slapped for cancelling so many meetings. 

I hope the OP gets this sorted, quickly. It is one situation that is all about protection of the customer & their funds. But I understand why she did it in the 1st place. Maybe bad advice from the solicitor. Where other option may have been available.

jimjames

born_again said:

Brie said:

Give them a deadline to hold the meeting or move your money.  

I hope the OP gets this sorted, quickly. It is one situation that is all about protection of the customer & their funds. But I understand why she did it in the 1st place. Maybe bad advice from the solicitor. Where other option may have been available.

It sounds like there was no advice from the solicitor purely done on her own initiative

Ergates

CaptWreck said:

The boy wants to move out of the flat, get a garden with a trampoline and a new school. We agree. The boy regresses and has nightmares whenever he sees or bumps into his biological dads family. It’s truest heartbreaking and all my family needs is a fresh start. 

If it comes down to it (and I don't know if it will or not) then this is a solid argument to be put forwards to the bank that a house purchase *is* in the best interests of your wife's son.

Keep_pedalling

Ergates said:

CaptWreck said:

The boy wants to move out of the flat, get a garden with a trampoline and a new school. We agree. The boy regresses and has nightmares whenever he sees or bumps into his biological dads family. It’s truest heartbreaking and all my family needs is a fresh start. 

If it comes down to it (and I don't know if it will or not) then this is a solid argument to be put forwards to the bank that a house purchase *is* in the best interests of your wife's son.

I doubt if the bank will agree,  a minor cannot purchase a house. 

mjm3346

Ergates said:

CaptWreck said:

The boy wants to move out of the flat, get a garden with a trampoline and a new school. We agree. The boy regresses and has nightmares whenever he sees or bumps into his biological dads family. It’s truest heartbreaking and all my family needs is a fresh start. 

If it comes down to it (and I don't know if it will or not) then this is a solid argument to be put forwards to the bank that a house purchase *is* in the best interests of your wife's son.

Possibly depending on the price of the house - wouldn't do to tie up the bulk of the child's money and delay their access to it in the future. A solicitor should probably be looking after the child's interests in this and if they accept the money should go to the mother that's securely sorted.
Whatever the outcome the original circumstances make this a good problem to have  

Ergates

Keep_pedalling said:

Ergates said:

CaptWreck said:

The boy wants to move out of the flat, get a garden with a trampoline and a new school. We agree. The boy regresses and has nightmares whenever he sees or bumps into his biological dads family. It’s truest heartbreaking and all my family needs is a fresh start. 

If it comes down to it (and I don't know if it will or not) then this is a solid argument to be put forwards to the bank that a house purchase *is* in the best interests of your wife's son.

I doubt if the bank will agree,  a minor cannot purchase a house. 

A minor could contribute the funds to purchase a family home that they'll live in.

Brie

born_again said:

Brie said:

Give them a deadline to hold the meeting or move your money.  

Give them a deadline yes. But without the meeting Halifax will block any money movement. 

I hope the OP gets this sorted, quickly. 

What I meant by given them a deadline to hold the meeting or move the money was that tell Halifax that they must do one or the other.  If they can't hold the meeting then they have to justify why they can't move the money by a certain date.

And I quite agree I hope this is sorted sooner rather than later, for the son's sake at the very least.