Accounts and death notifications - some observations

Snot

I was always under the impression you had to advise a Bank/BS about a death ASAP; but the first bank I contacted told me there was no rush and sometimes it made sense to delay the notification. In this particular case it was a savings account and if the linked current account was still open they would transfer the money with just the death cert. Otherwise they wanted sight of the Will or Probate etc
In the end I waited 3 months to notify the current account Bank; which allowed various refunds and final pension payments to be made directly in to the original account. I had no concerns about money leaving the account as each business cancelled their DD immediately upon notification.

The Tell Us Once service was a bit too efficient; HMRC sent me 3 letters, we are looking into things, new tax coding, and a tax refund cheque;  all 3 letters arrived together !
Unfortunately some pensions later paid out the pro rata final payments and they were all taxed at 50% rather than 0%; something to followup later.

The Death Notification service was rubbish in this case. I used them to inform 3 banks, one of which responded within a couple of days. I heard nothing from the other 2 for weeks and when I chased them up directly they both said they had received no notification from DNS. 

DavidT67

Even if you had notified the banks earlier, they still allow inbound payments to an account during the administration period, it's the outbound payments they would disallow.

Since TUO is dependent on registering the death, can take some weeks with the new requirements, and only notifies government organisations; it is wish to directly contact bereavement teams at non-governmental organisations as soon as you feel up to it. 

Snot

Can’t comment on other banks,  but the one I was dealing with stops both incoming and outgoing payments once informed of a death.

fwor

I think different banks have different rules. We used HSBC and their policy was that they suspend all existing accounts and provide (at no cost) an Executor's account, which allows all incoming payments, but only outgoing payments to a restricted, documented subset of payees (e.g. funeral expenses). I believe that this is the "legally correct" way to do it.

mta999

That is interesting - did HSBC automatically redirect all incoming payments to the new executo account?