Estates petition

topbanana1985

Evening all, I was wondering if anyone and everyone could sign this petition and share it?

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/751937

It's a petition to hopefully help estate beneficiaries, if they ever get stuck with the executor from hell.

bobster2

topbanana1985 said:

Evening all, I was wondering if anyone and everyone could sign this petition and share it?

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/751937

It's a petition to hopefully help estate beneficiaries, if they ever get stuck with the executor from hell.

Not going to sign - "supporting documentation" is far too vague an obligation. Being an executor is stressful enough - and vague extra obligations could make things more difficult for those stuck with "beneficiaries from hell".

Not saying you are one! But I think difficult beneficiaries are far more common than difficult executors.

user1977

Who is going to review this "supporting documentation" and pay the cost of doing so?

lincroft1710

Not signing, far too vague

Devongardener

Poorly worded and unlikely to achieve anything.

topbanana1985

Apologies for the vagueness, I tried wording it as best I could with the couple hundred character limitations that were given, which was quite difficult and the petitions office even reworded it all, so that it adhered to their rules, thus, that is mostly their wording.

I appreciate that there are also beneficiaries from hell as well as executors from hell. Both challenging and problematic. At least executors have the option of stepping down/renouncing or handing it over to the courts if they don't want to do it, where as beneficiaries have no options if they end up with dodgy executors. If beneficiaries can't afford court, they have to just bend over and take it from the executors, letting them get away with it or forfeit their inheritance.

A scenario in which this law could help: Executor steals from the estate, gets caught by the beneficiaries, so tries to blackmail the beneficiaries, by refusing to distribute the estate until the beneficiaries sign documentation to absolve the executor. Ombudsman, SRA and no win no fee companies, don't want to know, because the beneficiaries don't have any supporting documentation/evidence of the estate accounts, and therefore can't actually prove the executors wrong doing and court is unaffordable via a solicitor and too complex to do without a solicitor.
What are the beneficiaries to do?

Currently, executors can write whatever they want in the estate accounts and the beneficiaries are expected to just accept that what the executor has written is true and accurate.
Supporting documentation, which can simply be estate bank statements (as they are quick, easy, free and would show all payments in and out of the estate) if these were provided with the estate accounts, so that beneficiaries can review them personally and be able to compare them against what is written (or not written, in some cases) within the estate accounts, avoiding the costly, time consuming court process, just to obtain some documentation/bank statements.
Then, at least the beneficiaries would have the information/knowledge, evidence and option to take further steps, should they wish to do so, such as SRA or NWNF.

I'd have thought that if this petition did end up being discussed in parliament and potentially becoming law, the wording would be amended and refined. Surely they wouldn't just use what's written in the petition, would they? (This is a genuine question)

bobster2

topbanana1985 said

I'd have thought that if this petition did end up being discussed in parliament and potentially becoming law, the wording would be amended and refined. Surely they wouldn't just use what's written in the petition, would they? (This is a genuine question)

No of course they would not use the wording in the petition - it would just be used to prompt discussion.

I have read your previous threads - and have seen at times that you have struggled with the fact that beneficiaries are not clients of a solicitor working as an executor. The solicitor's client is the deceased.

This is very relevant to the issue of "supporting documentation" and perhaps giving beneficiaries a right to see all of this. When someone appoints an executor they are entrusting them to deal with their private documents and possessions. Someone might have all sorts of documentation relating to debts and assets containing details that they don't want beneficiaries to see. An executor could summarise these in estate accounts - without including all the details.

E.g. itemised banks statements for the years before someone died could reveal all sorts of personal spending. Executors need to go through these. But there's no reason that beneficiaries should be able to see all this. 

topbanana1985

bobster2 said:

topbanana1985 said

I'd have thought that if this petition did end up being discussed in parliament and potentially becoming law, the wording would be amended and refined. Surely they wouldn't just use what's written in the petition, would they? (This is a genuine question)

No of course they would not use the wording in the petition - it would just be used to prompt discussion.

I have read your previous threads - and have seen at times that you have struggled with the fact that beneficiaries are not clients of a solicitor working as an executor. The solicitor's client is the deceased.

This is very relevant to the issue of "supporting documentation" and perhaps giving beneficiaries a right to see all of this. When someone appoints an executor they are entrusting them to deal with their private documents and possessions. Someone might have all sorts of documentation relating to debts and assets containing details that they don't want beneficiaries to see. An executor could summarise these in estate accounts - without including all the details.

E.g. itemised banks statements for the years before someone died could reveal all sorts of personal spending. Executors need to go through these. But there's no reason that beneficiaries should be able to see all this. 

Thank you fir the clarification on the petition wording and discussion.

Yes, we have so far gone through 12 years of hell, and still are, as it's still not yet dealt with.

I agree that some people may wish to keep their spending and other habits, prior to death, a secret. But I wasn't referring to bank statements of prior to death, I was referring to bank statements from  the account that an executor is required to open, purely for the estate.
These bank statements would only contain/show all the money that has been gathered into the estate and all the money that has been paid out of the estate. 
It wouldn't contain any spending habits or info that happened prior the death. They would only contain transactions pertaining to the estate only.
 For example, if the beneficiaries know of a life insurance for £150k, but only £100k is paid into the estate bank account, then the beneficiaries would at least be able to have some sort of evidence of foul play.

I am aware that this isn't perfect, there are some flaws, such as, if beneficiaries aren't aware of any of the deceased's assets and debts, what's stopping the executor from not paying money into the estate account and putting it straight in his pocket. But at least it's a starting point for some and would hopefully help or be a step towards revealing any maladministration.


In our scenario, what the executor has written down in the estate accounts does not add up. Money has disappeared and the executor has lied about it. Not to mention all the typos and other issues.
As an example, £7,945 changes to £79,245, then becomes £7,495, which amount are we to believe is correct?
Bank statements from the estate bank account that the executor has opened would show us the correct amount, which we can then compare with what the executor has written in the accounts.

He did the same thing with our grandad's estate, unfortunately mum was unaware as she trusted him, because he is a "professional". So she figured there was no need to look into his work/calculations/accounting, so she just accepted that his work was correct and accurate. So this isn't just a one off, he has done it before, to our family and quite possibly hundreds of others, who all put their trust in him and don't question him, just because he's a solicitor. 

We also thought we could trust him, at first, but then I saw things weren't adding up in the letters and interim estate accounts, that he was providing. Which is why I started looking into it and questioning it, (both mums estate and I revisited grandad's too, hence how I know he has done it before) only to reveal a whole mass of issues.
I've also spoken to others who have had issues with him, but when asked why they didn't do anything about it, all said they were either too scared to go up against a solicitor or can't afford to. 

We have requested the bank statements from the estate account, but he has refused to provide them and is now refusing to distribute the estate until we sign a release, absolving him.
And us beneficiaries have absolutely no legal rights to any of the information within the estate, other than what the executor has written (made up).

Beneficiaries are getting stuck with dodgy executors and there's nothing they can do about it. So I was just hoping to try and help give beneficiaries a leg to stand on, in these situations.

tooldle

A solicitor is unlikely to have a separate ‘executor bank account’ for each client. I think asking for a copy of transactions into and out of their client account, would be unreasonable. Professionals can and do make mistakes. Casting my mind back to accountancy training, I remember well my tutor saying “if your balance sheet doesn’t balance, is the error divisible by 9. If so, you’ve likely reversed a pair of numbers somewhere”. There is of course no excuse for not back checking before sending figures to a client. 

Having been an executor myself, I’d not want the burden of producing what could be considerable extra paperwork to support the estate accounts. What happens if a lay executor has incurred significant legal costs that are subsequently challenged? I’m aware of a case where a beneficiary had mistakenly not acted on an instruction meaning the executor (supported by the same beneficiary) had to seek additional very expensive legal advice. Eventually the forgotten instruction came to light, rendering many thousands of pounds of charges unnecessary. 

Lay executors can easily get out of their depth with more complex estates.

lincroft1710

I'm a member of Change.org and have had hundreds of petitions sent to me for my support. If you really want to get anywhere with your petition (and to be honest I don't think it is viable), you need to tighten it up considerably.  

topbanana1985

tooldle said:

A solicitor is unlikely to have a separate ‘executor bank account’ for each client. I think asking for a copy of transactions into and out of their client account, would be unreasonable. Professionals can and do make mistakes. Casting my mind back to accountancy training, I remember well my tutor saying “if your balance sheet doesn’t balance, is the error divisible by 9. If so, you’ve likely reversed a pair of numbers somewhere”. There is of course no excuse for not back checking before sending figures to a client. 

Having been an executor myself, I’d not want the burden of producing what could be considerable extra paperwork to support the estate accounts. What happens if a lay executor has incurred significant legal costs that are subsequently challenged? I’m aware of a case where a beneficiary had mistakenly not acted on an instruction meaning the executor (supported by the same beneficiary) had to seek additional very expensive legal advice. Eventually the forgotten instruction came to light, rendering many thousands of pounds of charges unnecessary. 

Lay executors can easily get out of their depth with more complex estates.

I agree, everyone does make mistakes and I appreciate that we are all only human, mistakes are a part of life.
As you have been an executor previously, if a beneficiary came to you and said "it appears you have made some mistakes, look, this doesn't add up, this account number is incorrect and where has this £200 disappeared to?" 
I would imagine, you, being a decent person would apologise for said mistakes and rectify them immediately, wouldn't you?
The executor we are dealing with, he has not done that, in fact he has even denied the mistakes and said that there is nothing wrong with the accounts at all. He then continued to make further mistakes.

48 mistakes and an 8 page complaint to the ombudsman and he still denied the mistakes and carried on creating even more mistakes.

Hence our request for evidence to try and figure out what is true and what isn't. 
His denial of all the mistakes and refusal to provide any evidence supporting his claims/denials, and now his refusal to give us our inheritance until we absolve him, this just causes more suspicions for us. 

12 years this has been going on. Had he just admitted his mistakes and rectified them when we pointed them out to him, years ago, then we wouldn't be where we are right now.

Having lost both parents at a young age is tough enough as it is. Throw into the mix being stuck with an executor like this, with no legal rights for us and no ways to help ourselves, stressed is an understatement. Having been on this end of it, I think being an executor, personally I would find pretty easy and I certainly wouldn't treat beneficiaries in the disgraceful way that he has done to us. I would happily provide whatever evidence I could in order to rectify/ease a beneficiary's concerns, even if it did mean extra time and work for me.