lawyers probate fees

Thsi ahppened to my mate about a year ago. Dad named solicitor as executor and then 25 years later he snuffed it. AMte couldn't find any way out of it. Solicitor just said "I am following the wishes of the deceased".

A few hours work isn't fair but it is likely to be very remunerative.

A solicitor is entitled to reasonable fees for the work, not a ridiculous one.

The 1.5% was probably set when it was a small amount and the hourly rate needed to bring it up.

The only thing you can do is wait for the work to be completed and then go to the Law Society with the facts and ask: Is a fee of £x satisfactory for the amount of work done on this case?

It will be a simple matter for them to decide as fees are a mechanical process item per item.

Mmm. A quick look at the law society guide to non contentious work suggests this is at the upper end of 'fair charges'..

What I want to know is what recourse, if any, there is, before I sign the letter of engagement.

Sadly the Law society seems to say that 1.5% up to a million plus hourly ates is 'fair and reasonable'. At least in one place it does.In another it suggests 1% for probate plus 0.5% for dealing with property disposal of the house kind.

Mmm. In this article, it says that you can in fact sack a professional executor and appoint another in their place.

If you have a trusted family solicitor who you have used before, for example for conveyancing, why not ask them if they consider the figure you have been quoted to be reasonable or too high?

Why would you be signing a letter of engagement? He is appoiunted according to the will. Will he decline to do the work if you refuse to sign?

Well it says that the other executors can fire one of their own. It doesn't say anything about a non-executor firing an executor. I did hear of a case where a co-executor told a solicitor executor that the solicitor was welcome to stick around and help on condition he also worked for free. Solicitor resigned.

Just a thought but... An executor's duly is to consider the interest of the deceased's estate as a whole so perhaps you could argue that they are obliged to stand down and allow someone cheaper to do it. back it up with a cheaper quote. They might agree to match it.

I couldn't google much.. .

I don't believe that a percentage fee in such circumstances can be justified. Why exactly are you being asked to OK the fee? If you are a joint executor and can deal with matter why not ask the solicitor to resign his post?

Peter Crosland

That is an interesting point: Teh firm of solicitors is co executor to my sister, who is passing me power of attorney to act as executor.

No fees are mentioned in the will. \

My brother had his solicitor an myself as joint executors (and trustees). He suggested that I did the easy stuff (utility bills, house clearance and sale) while he dealt with probate, the tax, and distribution. He was charging an hourly rate and gave me a pretty accurate up-front estimate. It all worked very well, I always felt sufficiently in control, and they were always quick, responsive, and helpful. After the estate was proved they were more than happy to resign and appoint another family member as the second trustee for a legacy to a minor. I'd certainly consider doing this myself if I wanted to give my family some choice.

If there is no charging clause in the will then the solicitor cannot be paid out of the estate unless the other executor agrees. I suggest you ask them to resign their executorship and act yourself. I am surprised the solicitor is trying to get paid in this way.

Peter Crosland

It is possible that the nominated solicitors will renounce their role, provided that all beneficiaries agree and are able to nominate someone else, preferably one of their number rather than another firm of solicitors. We were successful in doing this when Lloyds Bank were nominated as executors of a family friend. They were very cooperative and charged a very nominal fee for their admin.

Otherwise, I suggest sitting down with the solicitors and dividing the work: they will probably be only too pleased for someone to deal with humdrum tasks like house clearance, and settling trivial bills, much of which you'd probably rather do anyway. Who needs a solicitor to pay the milkman?

Applying for probate isn't particularly difficult, and I found the Probate Registry staff extremely pleasant to deal with.

One possible advantage of involving solicitors would be if Deeds of Variation are a possibility, for example to enable bequests to skip a generation, or to set up Trusts with a view to reducing the beneficiaries' estates' eventual IHT, but these can be arranged quite separately from applying for Probate.

If only people realised that an amateur executor can always call in professional assistance...

In fact, handling probate on an average uncomplicated estate is very very easy. I've handled it personally on my father's and my mother-in-law's estates and it was not at all difficult. Why people feel they have to get solicitors involved beats me.

My mother in law was charged £150 by a solicitor for setting up a simple power of attorney. All this involved (at the time) was completing a simple 'pro-forma' and getting the applicant to sign it. When my father wanted one setting up I downloaded the pro-forma off the internet, got him to fill it in and sign it - and that was it, job done for nothing.

Ret.

if theyre getting an hourly rate for their work (as my solicitors did for 3 probates) what justification do they have for a percentage of the estate?

it's more than a few hours work.

In such cases if one thinks the fee is too high, an appeal to the 'Taxing Master' (nothing to do with Inland Revenue) at the court is possible.

In Property Reversionary and Investment Company v Secretary for the Environment, the Secretary thought that legal fees associated with taking land for a public work was too high. the Taxing Master's decision was appealed, and the judgment included: "The object of the exercise, whether a solicitor ois preparing a bill of costs in relation to non-contentious business, or the Law Society is certifying such a bill, or the court is taxing (re-assessing) it, is to arrive at a sum which is fair and reasonable, having regard for all the circumstances. It is an exercise in assessment, an exercise in balanced judgmentb - not an arithmetical calculation. It is wrong always to start by assessing the direct and indirect expenses of the solicitor, represented by the time spnt on the business. This must always be taken into account, but it is not necessarily, or even usually, a basic factor to which all others are related. Thus, although the labour included will usually be directly related to, and reflected by, the time spent, the skill and specialised knowledge involved may vary greatly for different parts of that time. Again not all time spent on a transaction necessarily lends itself to being recorded, although the fullest possible records should be kept."

This supports basing the fee partly on value of the work, even for non contentious matters.

What is more important, is to make sure all the beneficiaries sing with one voice. If beneficiaries squabble, legal fees will go through the roof. This happened in New Zealand. A, B, C and D shared equally. 'A' lived in the family home and wanted to buy the others out (C and D agreed). 'B' was adamant she wanted to have the family home. A trustee company was the executor and the fees went through the roof with the squabbling. A, C and D wanted to remove the executor for not agreeing with the majority of the beneficiaries. That was not the executor's duty - the executor's duty is to distribute the estate in accordance with the testator's wishes. I do not know what the company did, but the obvious answer would have been to put the house on the market and let A and B make offers in the usual way.

A trap my brother and I are in too. Neither of us like the solicitor we are stuck with! We are sure he told my mother that naming him woukd save hassle later.

We tried to ue another solicitor to do the conveyancing. Whereupon the named solicitor mumbled things about causing him extra work, so extra charges. He eventually got quite tetchy about it so we gave in!

Moral is, never name a solicitor as your executor.

BTW: his charges are £190.00 per hour. No percentage. He reckoned 20-30 hours.

Absolutely. The probate system almost encourages you to d-i-y. Even the IHT issues on larger estates are usually pretty straightforward, saving you probably another 1.5% in accountants fees. As soon as someone asks you for a percentage of the value of the estate, you know you're being taken for a ride because extra noughts on the end of a figure don't make it more complicated or more time consuming.