Payment of DDs for utilities on deceased bank account

milton1970

Hopefully someone can help ..

Parent passed recently and we will need to go through probate etc that may take some time. Part of the estate is the house that will require heating / lighting etc. Can we leave the DDs running against the deceased’s bank account ? Or if the bank account becomes frozen how do we pay from the estate ? - we are yet to arrange Executor bank account.

What is the usual process in paying such bills .. do we leave the DDs in place & they continue? Do we contact the utilities companies?

TIA

Keep_pedalling

No, the bank needs to be informed of the at which point the account will be frozen. Speak to the supplier’s bereavement team to inform them of the death. They should provide a final statement and allow the administrator to set up an account to cover the bills from now on. Unless there is a very large amount of cash in the account the bank should release any funds to the executors without having to wait for probate so you should still be able to use them to pay the ongoing costs associated with the house.

Also contact the LA ASAP to get the council tax stopped at you will be exempt until 6 months after obtaining probate.

Snot

I didn't tell the bank for weeks, this allowed various refunds to be sent direct into the account. Thus saving any complications with cheques and potentially needing an executors account.

For the utilities I contacted each one and they all cancelled the DD's, the water account was cancelled so no ongoing charges, the gas & electric bills will be settled once the house is sold.

The caveat being I was already handing all the finances for years so knew exactly what was due and when. If the account was an unknown and there could be surprise debits it would make sense to notify the bank. Apparently some banks will freeze all transactions whereas others will still allow credits to the account once notified of a death.

I wouldn't bother with any of the notification services who say they will inform all Banks and Building societies, I found it was very unreliable and in any case you still need to contact each one yourself later, if they want the death cert etc. So better to do it yourself individually and keep control.

Although, the Gov Tell Us Once service worked really well.

When I eventually told the current account bank, they weren't at all bothered by the delay in informing them.

Keep_pedalling

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82051487#Comment_82051487

The danger of not informing the bank is that other outgoing payments can be taken that may be difficult to get back.

poseidon1

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82051487#Comment_82051487

Sounds pretty irresponsible unless a disproportionate amount was sitting in the non interest bearing current account, so risk of going into overdraft was remote.

Also see issues with continued funding of house insurance premiums on that basis, in the event a potential claim arose whilst property still empty and the insurance company was never advised of the death, similarly with car insurance etc.

Snot

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82051898#Comment_82051898

Maybe I didn't make my post clear, I told all the institutions about the death except the bank; using your example of the insurance company, they refunded the partial premium direct into the deceased account. This wouldn't have been possible if I had immediately closed the current account. There were a number of other refunds in the same vein.

For further clarity, it was one of the banks where the saving account was held that advised not to rush closing the current account, they explained that if the linked account was still open they could transfer without probate, not that we used that option.

bobster2

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82051924#Comment_82051924

After a bank has "closed" a current account having been informed of a death - until you complete administration, if the account is just in the name of the deceased then most will still accept cheques payable to the deceased as deposits. So what you describe as "not possible" is in fact very possible - and exactly how I dealt with refunds from utilities etc without a formal executor account.

Linton

In my experience there is no requirement to continue paying the DDs. If you inform the utility companies’ bereavement teams of the death they will delay any payments until after the house is sold. In our case the water company simply said there would be no charge for usage after the death.

It was wrong not to inform the bank immediately.