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Probate solicitor errors - how to proceed / complain

Claret1882
Posts: 6 Forumite
I and my wife are the only two executors named on my father-in-law's will. Owing to some family tensions we decided, after I had done much of the initial work of identifying creditors, to engage a local firm of solicitors to deal with the probate application and administration of the estate.
I assumed, wrongly it turns out, that I would be able to trust that they would know what they were doing. This is being handled by a 'legal assistant' (the husband of the actual solicitor). Once the value of assets, mainly savings, stocks & shares ISA and a house, had been established we were told it was an 'excepted' estate, and the application was submitted in February (not sure of precise date).
After hearing nothing for a while I asked for an update and the legal assis checked the online portal and told us the application had been 'stopped'. He then forwarded on March 13th a copy of an email from the Probate Office that had been sent on 25th February, but he said hadn't been received (implausible) that said "The Net Qualifying Value of the IHT Estate you have provided is above the excepted limit." Once I looked into it, I realised he had simply blundered, presumably assuming that because the use of nil rate band on the property would mean that no IHT would be payable, this meant it was an excepted estate. Five minutes on the HMRC online calculator confirmed this was not the case. He tried to claim that 'the system must have changed' but the last material change was in January 2022 so there's no excuse for a legal professional not to be on top of this.
Consequently, IHT forms needed to be submitted. I had to chase him to get these done (in one phone call he actually said 'there's a lot to fill in, so I'm trying to build up the energy to get it done'!) and when he submitted them for us to check and sign, there were errors on every single one, a couple of the supplementary forms that needed to be sent hadn't been done, and he had made quite serious errors such as getting the date of death wrong, putting stocks and shares ISA investments under bank and building society accounts on the main form, rather than submitting the required separate stocks and shares form, and including non-eligible liabilities such as the probate fee (I checked all this- and more - by phoning the HMRC phone line to ensure they were accurate before submitting). Incidentally, I also discovered that HMRC would be happy with an online property valuation from Zoopla or similar, so the £200 we paid to the estate agent friend of our 'legal guy', believing a professional valuation was needed, was unnecessary.
I phoned the Probate Registry for advice, and they would not discuss the case itself with me as it was being dealt with by a solicitor, but did say it would be likely to delay the process considerably if I were to withdraw the application and resubmit it myself, so I feel somewhat trapped, having to continue with a solicitor's firm that has proved incompetent (there have been other issues such as emailing a drastically incorrect estimate of the estate value to all beneficiaries before we got to the application stage, and committing a GDPR breach by accidentally including us as recipients of an email to another client).
Obviously this delay, as well as being upsetting and time-consuming for us, is also quite costly. We had early serious interest in the house, but that potential buyer couldn't wait indefinitely for probate, and in the meantime we continue to have insurance/utilities to pay, and I have had to invest considerable time into checking everything, and filling the IHT forms myself, which negates the point of paying for the service.
Sorry this has been a bit long winded but I'm wondering if anyone with experience in this field has any advice on how best to deal with this from this point on. I'm reluctant to initiate a complaint while I'm still having to rely on this person at least until probate is granted and funds are released.
And when I do complain, what might be the best way of approaching it, and what should I reasonably looking for in terms of redress? I feel we shouldn't really be paying them anything since we are in a worse position than if I had done this all myself (and have ended up having to do the most time-consuming element, the IHT forms), but I suspect quantifying that is tricky.
I assumed, wrongly it turns out, that I would be able to trust that they would know what they were doing. This is being handled by a 'legal assistant' (the husband of the actual solicitor). Once the value of assets, mainly savings, stocks & shares ISA and a house, had been established we were told it was an 'excepted' estate, and the application was submitted in February (not sure of precise date).
After hearing nothing for a while I asked for an update and the legal assis checked the online portal and told us the application had been 'stopped'. He then forwarded on March 13th a copy of an email from the Probate Office that had been sent on 25th February, but he said hadn't been received (implausible) that said "The Net Qualifying Value of the IHT Estate you have provided is above the excepted limit." Once I looked into it, I realised he had simply blundered, presumably assuming that because the use of nil rate band on the property would mean that no IHT would be payable, this meant it was an excepted estate. Five minutes on the HMRC online calculator confirmed this was not the case. He tried to claim that 'the system must have changed' but the last material change was in January 2022 so there's no excuse for a legal professional not to be on top of this.
Consequently, IHT forms needed to be submitted. I had to chase him to get these done (in one phone call he actually said 'there's a lot to fill in, so I'm trying to build up the energy to get it done'!) and when he submitted them for us to check and sign, there were errors on every single one, a couple of the supplementary forms that needed to be sent hadn't been done, and he had made quite serious errors such as getting the date of death wrong, putting stocks and shares ISA investments under bank and building society accounts on the main form, rather than submitting the required separate stocks and shares form, and including non-eligible liabilities such as the probate fee (I checked all this- and more - by phoning the HMRC phone line to ensure they were accurate before submitting). Incidentally, I also discovered that HMRC would be happy with an online property valuation from Zoopla or similar, so the £200 we paid to the estate agent friend of our 'legal guy', believing a professional valuation was needed, was unnecessary.
I phoned the Probate Registry for advice, and they would not discuss the case itself with me as it was being dealt with by a solicitor, but did say it would be likely to delay the process considerably if I were to withdraw the application and resubmit it myself, so I feel somewhat trapped, having to continue with a solicitor's firm that has proved incompetent (there have been other issues such as emailing a drastically incorrect estimate of the estate value to all beneficiaries before we got to the application stage, and committing a GDPR breach by accidentally including us as recipients of an email to another client).
Obviously this delay, as well as being upsetting and time-consuming for us, is also quite costly. We had early serious interest in the house, but that potential buyer couldn't wait indefinitely for probate, and in the meantime we continue to have insurance/utilities to pay, and I have had to invest considerable time into checking everything, and filling the IHT forms myself, which negates the point of paying for the service.
Sorry this has been a bit long winded but I'm wondering if anyone with experience in this field has any advice on how best to deal with this from this point on. I'm reluctant to initiate a complaint while I'm still having to rely on this person at least until probate is granted and funds are released.
And when I do complain, what might be the best way of approaching it, and what should I reasonably looking for in terms of redress? I feel we shouldn't really be paying them anything since we are in a worse position than if I had done this all myself (and have ended up having to do the most time-consuming element, the IHT forms), but I suspect quantifying that is tricky.
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Claret1882 said:I and my wife are the only two executors named on my father-in-law's will. Owing to some family tensions we decided, after I had done much of the initial work of identifying creditors, to engage a local firm of solicitors to deal with the probate application and administration of the estate.
I assumed, wrongly it turns out, that I would be able to trust that they would know what they were doing. This is being handled by a 'legal assistant' (the husband of the actual solicitor). Once the value of assets, mainly savings, stocks & shares ISA and a house, had been established we were told it was an 'excepted' estate, and the application was submitted in February (not sure of precise date).
After hearing nothing for a while I asked for an update and the legal assis checked the online portal and told us the application had been 'stopped'. He then forwarded on March 13th a copy of an email from the Probate Office that had been sent on 25th February, but he said hadn't been received (implausible) that said "The Net Qualifying Value of the IHT Estate you have provided is above the excepted limit." Once I looked into it, I realised he had simply blundered, presumably assuming that because the use of nil rate band on the property would mean that no IHT would be payable, this meant it was an excepted estate. Five minutes on the HMRC online calculator confirmed this was not the case. He tried to claim that 'the system must have changed' but the last material change was in January 2022 so there's no excuse for a legal professional not to be on top of this.
Consequently, IHT forms needed to be submitted. I had to chase him to get these done (in one phone call he actually said 'there's a lot to fill in, so I'm trying to build up the energy to get it done'!) and when he submitted them for us to check and sign, there were errors on every single one, a couple of the supplementary forms that needed to be sent hadn't been done, and he had made quite serious errors such as getting the date of death wrong, putting stocks and shares ISA investments under bank and building society accounts on the main form, rather than submitting the required separate stocks and shares form, and including non-eligible liabilities such as the probate fee (I checked all this- and more - by phoning the HMRC phone line to ensure they were accurate before submitting). Incidentally, I also discovered that HMRC would be happy with an online property valuation from Zoopla or similar, so the £200 we paid to the estate agent friend of our 'legal guy', believing a professional valuation was needed, was unnecessary.
I phoned the Probate Registry for advice, and they would not discuss the case itself with me as it was being dealt with by a solicitor, but did say it would be likely to delay the process considerably if I were to withdraw the application and resubmit it myself, so I feel somewhat trapped, having to continue with a solicitor's firm that has proved incompetent (there have been other issues such as emailing a drastically incorrect estimate of the estate value to all beneficiaries before we got to the application stage, and committing a GDPR breach by accidentally including us as recipients of an email to another client).
Obviously this delay, as well as being upsetting and time-consuming for us, is also quite costly. We had early serious interest in the house, but that potential buyer couldn't wait indefinitely for probate, and in the meantime we continue to have insurance/utilities to pay, and I have had to invest considerable time into checking everything, and filling the IHT forms myself, which negates the point of paying for the service.
Sorry this has been a bit long winded but I'm wondering if anyone with experience in this field has any advice on how best to deal with this from this point on. I'm reluctant to initiate a complaint while I'm still having to rely on this person at least until probate is granted and funds are released.Claret1882 said:
And when I do complain, what might be the best way of approaching it, and what should I reasonably looking for in terms of redress? I feel we shouldn't really be paying them anything since we are in a worse position than if I had done this all myself (and have ended up having to do the most time-consuming element, the IHT forms), but I suspect quantifying that is tricky.
You don't have to quantify your losses at this stage, but simply indicate where these have arisen/where you have incurred costs which would not have been incurred had you done the job yourself.Googling on your question might have been both quicker and easier, if you're only after simple facts rather than opinions!1
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