IHT calculation question. Funeral costs paid directly by deceased's bank to Funeral Director.

lohr500

I think the answer is obvious, but I would like to check this if anyone can help.

I've worked through the online .Gov IHT/Probate calculator to establish that my late father's estate falls under the excepted category.

As part of the calculation, there is a box to complete covering funeral expenses.

My father's bank are able to pay the Funeral Company directly from his frozen bank account which will reduce the value of the cash assets used to calculate IHT.

In this case, am I correct in thinking I SHOULD NOT include the Funeral Company costs in the IHT calculator section covering funeral costs, since they are already covered by the reduction in his cash assets?

It seems logical NOT to include it to avoid double counting, but I would like to be sure 

Thanks in advance for any help/confirmation.


(There will also be a modest funeral expense covering his wake that I plan to pay from my own account and claim back from the estate once probate has been finalised. 
My thinking is that I should add this cost to the Funeral Cost section of the IHT/Probate calculation as it is deemed to be a legitimate funeral expense for IHT calculation purposes.)

HappyHarry

The calculator asks about assets of the deceased on the day they died.

At that time, the funeral costs had not been paid, so the money in the bank account should be included on the calculator.

Then you can add the funeral costs to the calculator where asked. This way, they will not be double counted.

lohr500

HappyHarry said:

The calculator asks about assets of the deceased on the day they died.

At that time, the funeral costs had not been paid, so the money in the bank account should be included on the calculator.

Then you can add the funeral costs to the calculator where asked. This way, they will not be double counted.

Thanks for the reply. That makes sense.