Octopus still no refund after 13 days!

masonic

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81941271#Comment_81941271

"When someone passes away, banks close their account right away, so any refund has to be sent to the executor’s account, which is naturally different from the dead account holder. Considering around 500,000 people die each year, it’s not exactly a rare occurrence."

The bit in bold should not be happening. See https://www.thegazette.co.uk/all-notices/content/103884 and https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/family/death-and-wills/dealing-with-the-financial-affairs-of-someone-who-has-died/

If the bank account of the deceased was closed right away, then that could be grounds for complaint. It is the responsibility of the executor to arrange this at the appropriate time, on your instructions once you can be recognised as the legal representative for the deceased. The account should have been frozen to prevent further payments out of the account to ensure the estate is distributed correctly. There is certainly precedent for banks to continue to accept incoming payments into the account. Some banks may completely lock down and bounce the refund (although if others do not it cannot be necessary) and standard practice in this situation is to issue a cheque which can be deposited in the executor account.

The fact you've been able to navigate this and find a better solution for yourself, and needed to wait only 15 days, should be celebrated as a success. It took me a formal complaint and about 2 months to get them to send some "standards of performance" compensation to my bank account after erroneously crediting it to a credit card I'd closed months earlier.

Regarding the bit about faster payments you edited in after I'd hit reply - they are using the Direct Debit as a security/anti-fraud measure, to confirm the account is active and its details (account name, address) match those you provided.

JARING

Ok, let's be very precise then, on notification either from family, executors, or from the commercial notification services that monitor the BMD database, the banks immediately close the account for online banking, and stop any electronic payments in or out leaving cheques as the only method of paying money in. No money can be withdrawn except for very specific cases like paying for a funeral where the bank will pay the funeral director directly from the deceased's account. However, the banks will only pay ONE invoice, so in this case, the whole funeral had to be paid in advance as the funeral director refused to accept part-payment of the deposit alone as the banks often mess them around and refuse payment of the second invoice until probate is granted (this Probate took 2 weeks to be granted, because I did it myself, but it can easily take very much longer).

In this case ISAs were also held with the bank which slightly tipped the total over the £50k threshold that required Probate to release any funds - below this limit a Death Certificate is adequate to release funds although the limits vary between banks. This despite the fact that the funeral expenses dropped the total below the £50k limit and of the £50k about £45k were the cash ISAs. NatWest doing their best to make a difficult time even more difficult.

masonic

Yes, NatWest is a bank I am aware is more restrictive than it needs to be and wouldn't allow even incoming payments like an energy account refund (though I was not aware they still let cheques be deposited - not sure how they justify the different treatment between electronic and cheque). HSBC group, for example, will permit incoming payments. I see no good reason why they should be stopped, and with AML obligations getting more and more onerous on a wider range of organisations, this is likely to impact more people, so perhaps the more restrictive banks like NatWest need to look again at their internal policies. Goodness only knows how a refund to a debit card would need to be handled. The merchant might be behind a third party payment service, or be located abroad. Redirecting it could entail a huge amount of unnecessary hassle, or be impossible in practice.

JARING

I was not aware they still let cheques be deposited

Reading between the lines I suspect they would rather not accept cheques either but they are forced to do so as there could easily be valid cheques "in the post" (literally) or being processed although that's much quicker these days.

NatWest say cheques can only be paid in at a NatWest branch, but given they've closed all the local ones, I found that taking a cheque to the Post Office somehow works. Annoyingly the only people who send cheques, payable to the deceased, seem to be Government departments, like DVLA. Most other organisations seem happy to send funds electronically (without setting up a DD) to the executor's account.

You are right about incoming electronic payments - it's irritating that NatWest block these.

MWT

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81941271#Comment_81941271

Why can't a refund be made using Faster Payments? Why go through the pain of setting up a Direct Debit account for the executor just to make a refund?

It isn't just to make a refund, it is also to take payment for any use including the standing charge while the property remains unsold…

JARING

it is also to take payment for any use including the standing charge while the property remains unsold

Well, Octopus, South East Water and Council Tax (for 6 months only) all said there is no charge until the property is sold, utilities remain turned on but they expect your usage to be minimal. I'm not quite sure what happens when you sell the property. Perhaps they hit you with a big bill? Will have to wait and see.

For example, South East Water sent a cheque for the refund and don't even have the executor's account details.

It seems each utility has a slightly different approach.

MWT

It shouldn't be a big bill, but when the property is sold and you close the account you should expect to pay for any energy used since the previous bill and all of the standing charges for that period.