Driving Licence and Passport of deceased person

Landuj

Hello

My mother died in 2020 and after various difficulties with probate I am finally nearly ready to close the estate accounts, and at the same time file away all the physical documents. I've kept all these in an archive box and reviewing them before filing away, I found at the bottom her passport and driving licence. Soon after she died in 2020 I used the 'Tell Us Once' service so the Passport Office and DVLA should already have cancelled these back then.

But I was surprised to find them there, as I thought I would have had to return the physical passport and driving licence. I don't recall being asked to send them in, but 2020 seems a long time ago now, and the only document trail I have about Tell Us Once is an e-mail from the registrar with the telephone number and code to use the service, so it is hard for me to know. Perhaps I sent the documents in and they were returned to me. The passport does have the corners snipped off. And both are now past their expiry dates as well.

So my question is just whether I need to give the (now expired, and I believe already cancelled) physical passport and driving licence back to the Passport Office and DVLA respectively, and if not whether they should be securely destroyed, or need to be archived with the rest of the documents?

Very grateful if any fellow money-savers know the answer! Thank you.

p00hsticks

My brother also died in 2020 and like you I used the Tell Us Once service. 
I'm pretty sure we weren't asked to return either his driving licence or passport.  

Savvy_Sue

Clipped corner indicates passport is cancelled. I don't think you need to do more.

poppystar

I didn’t use the tell us once service but notified Passport Office and DVLA and sent back both documents. Once the passport was cancelled they sent it back as I’d requested on the form but they included a note that should I no longer wish to have it I should return it to them to be securely destroyed. In practice I doubt anyone does this - and quite frankly I would be more worried about it getting lost in post than by ability to securely enough destroy it myself! 

Pleased someone else is still closing off an estate from 2000, I thought I was taking much too long. 

Marcon

Landuj said:

Hello

My mother died in 2020 and after various difficulties with probate I am finally nearly ready to close the estate accounts, and at the same time file away all the physical documents. I've kept all these in an archive box and reviewing them before filing away, I found at the bottom her passport and driving licence. Soon after she died in 2020 I used the 'Tell Us Once' service so the Passport Office and DVLA should already have cancelled these back then.

But I was surprised to find them there, as I thought I would have had to return the physical passport and driving licence. I don't recall being asked to send them in, but 2020 seems a long time ago now, and the only document trail I have about Tell Us Once is an e-mail from the registrar with the telephone number and code to use the service, so it is hard for me to know. Perhaps I sent the documents in and they were returned to me. The passport does have the corners snipped off. And both are now past their expiry dates as well.

So my question is just whether I need to give the (now expired, and I believe already cancelled) physical passport and driving licence back to the Passport Office and DVLA respectively, and if not whether they should be securely destroyed, or need to be archived with the rest of the documents?

Very grateful if any fellow money-savers know the answer! Thank you.

Securely destroyed; no need to do anything else or keep them.

BooJewels

I still have the ones from the various family estates I've done.  No one ever asked for them and I'm happy to keep them locked in the safe in an envelope, just for sentimental reasons.  I also have various ones from the previous generation that my parents had similarly kept and I shall just keep them all.

kuratowski

In my case, DVLA wrote to me asking for the driving licence to be returned to them, so that's what I've done.  The passport has been cancelled, but we were allowed to keep it.

BooJewels

That's funny @kuratowski - I've done 3 with driving licences recently through Tell Us Once and not one has generated any communication from either DVLA or the passport office.  But all 3 generated a letter from HMRC, as well as benefits/pensions stopping immediately - so it clearly 'went through'.

kuratowski

The DVLA letter was prompted by Tell us once.  95% of the letter is telling me what to do about my father's car.  But there is a sentence at the end asking me to return his driving licence.

Sarahspangles

Landuj said:

Hello

My mother died in 2020 and after various difficulties with probate I am finally nearly ready to close the estate accounts, and at the same time file away all the physical documents. I've kept all these in an archive box and reviewing them before filing away, I found at the bottom her passport and driving licence. Soon after she died in 2020 I used the 'Tell Us Once' service so the Passport Office and DVLA should already have cancelled these back then.

But I was surprised to find them there, as I thought I would have had to return the physical passport and driving licence. I don't recall being asked to send them in, but 2020 seems a long time ago now, and the only document trail I have about Tell Us Once is an e-mail from the registrar with the telephone number and code to use the service, so it is hard for me to know. Perhaps I sent the documents in and they were returned to me. The passport does have the corners snipped off. And both are now past their expiry dates as well.

So my question is just whether I need to give the (now expired, and I believe already cancelled) physical passport and driving licence back to the Passport Office and DVLA respectively, and if not whether they should be securely destroyed, or need to be archived with the rest of the documents?

Very grateful if any fellow money-savers know the answer! Thank you.

I’ve looked up what we did when FIL and then MIL passed away.

When FIL passed away we hadn’t located his passport at the point we were filling in TellUsOnce, the online form asks for a passport number. The instruction was to return the passport to them if we later located it, which we did, they acknowledged receipt but did not return it. I expect we could have asked for it to be returned if it had had sentimental value.

When MIL passed away we had her passport, so we could give the number straight away on the TellUsOnce webform. They did not require us to return it or destroy it.

FIL surrendered his driving licence while he was still alive, so we didn’t need to deal with that.

user1977

You (used to) get the expired passport back with a clipped corner when you renewed it. So it’s already been done.