Missing Beneficiary Insurance.
Missing beneficiary insurance protects the executor, administrator, trustee and the beneficiaries traced. You never know when any beneficiaries that are unknown or missing may come forward at a later date.If any should appear, the cost of dealing with the claim is paid by the policy. If the claim is successful the policy would pay the claimant the amount claimed as well.Without a policy, the claimant would look to the executor, administrator, trustee and/or beneficiaries for compensation. The premiums can be paid as reasonable expenses in the administration of an estate.Missing Beneficiaries Insurance is usually only considered as the research and tracing of the wills and descendants comes into its final stages. The underwriters will only issue cover once they are satisfied that the correct steps to find all beneficiaries have been taken. In order to do this a proposal, outlining the actions taken with copies of correspondence and the search methods used is required.We can obtain quotations for this cover. Sometimes the need is found when winding up a property under the Reverter of Sites Act 1987.We would only obtain cover (through an appropriately qualified insurance broker) where we are running the case. If it is not a case of ours, we cannot get involved: just Google “Missing Beneficiary Insurance”.
Initial Information Required for Missing Beneficiary Insurance.
• A good explanatory letter of the circumstances.• Details of the will or intestacy.• Full details of research undertaken with copies of correspondence and genealogists’ reports where applicable or required.• A copy of the family tree.• The value of the estate for distribution.• The limit of indemnity required and how this has been calculated.• Details as to when each missing beneficiary was last seen or heard of, by whom and the circumstances in which this occurred.• If advertisements or notices have been placed on the internet requesting information or in newspapers etc relating to missing beneficiaries, full details should be provided.
Missing Beneficiary Insurance.
I picked this up from a post by the Head of Technical at the Society of Will Writers:
Please will you explain the process an Executor is expected to do when they are unable to locate a beneficiary?A: Executors would need to make every effort to find the missing person. This may extend to making enquiries with the deceased’s friends and other relatives to obtain the beneficiary’s whereabouts, taking out advertisements in local papers in the area where the beneficiary was last known to be residing and placing the usual section 27 advertisement in the London Gazette.If the person cannot be found by the executors, they would have 3 options:
- The legacy may be paid into court and the rest of the estate distributed accordingly. The court would keep hold of the legacy for a certain number of years in case the person reappears and if he does not then it would be distributed accordingly according to the terms of the Will.
- The executors could apply for a Benjamin Order*; this is an order granted by the court giving leave to distribute the estate on a certain assumption, for example the assumption that the missing beneficiary predeceased. This would allow the executors to distribute the estate to the other beneficiaries. Prior to the granting of the Benjamin Order the executors would be expected to have done all they can to trace the beneficiary. Applying for a Benjamin Order would be an expensive procedure.
- Another available option is for the executors to take out missing beneficiary insurance and distribute the estate accordingly to other beneficiaries. Again, all reasonable steps must have been taken to trace the missing beneficiary.
*Benjamin Order: an order that the personal representatives may distribute the estate on the footing that certain events have or have not happened. It sometimes occurs that the personal representatives cannot trace beneficiaries after all reasonable efforts and have no idea whether they remain alive. Missing beneficiary insurance will probably be quicker and cheaper.The above are my comments.
To look at the cost of Missing Beneficiary insurance see below:
Missing Beneficiary InsuranceAllows the estate to be distributed without any future liability if a missing or unknown beneficiary comes forward to claim against the estate. It protects the liabilities of the executors, personal representatives and beneficiaries. The beneficiaries can relax safe in the knowledge that they won’t need to repay any of their inheritance if another beneficiary comes forward.You can find out more or get a quote from Insuristic here.
