DIY probate after professional executor has renounced 14 August 2022 at 6:12PM in Deaths, funerals & probate 8 replies 565 views

SSJ66

As our mother’s estate is uncomplicated and we’ve already done most of the notification of organisations ourselves, the professional executor named in the will has agreed to renounce. My brother and I have the will, and the letter of renunciation. As far as we can tell we now have to apply for probate as administrators using a paper form and cannot use the online form. However I have also seen in various places online mention of us being able to become executors, but we can’t work out how to do that. Please could anyone advise? 

Thank you. 

getmore4less

You need to apply for letters of administration with will attached.

Only named  executors apply for probate.

(In practice it's the same)

SSJ66

To whom do we apply for letters of administration? Is that the completion of form PA1P for citizen applicants? And then we get letters of administration after the 8 week (probably longer) wait? Thanks. 

msb1234

This is what the Gov website says

Give up your right to apply

Fill in form PA15 to give up your right to apply permanently. This is known as ‘renunciation’.

Appoint someone to apply on your behalf

You can appoint someone to apply for you if either:

• you’re the only executor named in the will
• there are other executors named in the will, but all of them are either holding ‘power reserved’ or have given up their right to apply permanently

Fill in form PA11 to appoint someone to apply for you.

p00hsticks

msb1234 said:

This is what the Gov website says

Give up your right to apply

Fill in form PA15 to give up your right to apply permanently. This is known as ‘renunciation’.

Appoint someone to apply on your behalf

You can appoint someone to apply for you if either:

• you’re the only executor named in the will
• there are other executors named in the will, but all of them are either holding ‘power reserved’ or have given up their right to apply permanently

Fill in form PA11 to appoint someone to apply for you.

But as far as I can see none of that is actually relevant to the OP ?

They're not the named executors and they;re not renunciating - the named solicitors have already done that.

Nor do they want anyone to apply to handle the estate on their behalf.

What the OP is looking for now is how they themselves go about applying for letters of administration with a will in their position as close kin of the deceased, having already got the solicitors to renounce

jsatellite

I did this last year for my mum. The named executors renounced so I could apply for "letters of administration with will annexed". I couldn't do it online - I had to do a paper application, filling in form PA1P and sending the signed renunciations (form PA15) along with the original will. In section 3.6 you list the named executors and the reason for their renouncing. It took 21 weeks from when I sent my application to receive the grant, and that was with much chasing by phone.

SSJ66

jsatellite said:

I did this last year for my mum. The named executors renounced so I could apply for "letters of administration with will annexed". I couldn't do it online - I had to do a paper application, filling in form PA1P and sending the signed renunciations (form PA15) along with the original will. In section 3.6 you list the named executors and the reason for their renouncing. It took 21 weeks from when I sent my application to receive the grant, and that was with much chasing by phone.

Thank you. 21 weeks! That seems unreasonably long. Oh well, it is what it is. I can’t fathom why my mum didn’t make us executors. Presumably she was persuaded by the will writers. 

Flugelhorn

the problem with people making wills is that they get the "oh probate is so complicated, you can't possibly leave X with so much work to do, it isn't fair on them... etc etc "  - they want you to leave the place with a nice warm fuzzy feeling that "everything is sorted" 

can be quite hard to resist the sell unless you are well informed and determined

TBagpuss

SSJ66 said:

jsatellite said:

I did this last year for my mum. The named executors renounced so I could apply for "letters of administration with will annexed". I couldn't do it online - I had to do a paper application, filling in form PA1P and sending the signed renunciations (form PA15) along with the original will. In section 3.6 you list the named executors and the reason for their renouncing. It took 21 weeks from when I sent my application to receive the grant, and that was with much chasing by phone.

Thank you. 21 weeks! That seems unreasonably long. Oh well, it is what it is. I can’t fathom why my mum didn’t make us executors. Presumably she was persuaded by the will writers. 

Or her thinking may have been "I'll spare the childnre all the stress of dealing with this when they are grieving" She may have been pressured, especially if she used will writers rathr than a proper solicitor, but it's very common for people to chose not to appoint their children because they don't want to burden them, or because they (the testator) wouldn't have wanted to do it and assumes that their children will feel the same.