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Danger of leaving chaos behind
How can people prepare for dying, and leave their affairs in good order? Julia McGuinness finds out what can be done
 Professional help: a couple discuss their wills with a solicitor
PHOTOS JUPITER |
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IN a survey undertaken earlier this year by Christian Legacy, a consortium of six Christian charities, 97 per cent of the 182 Church Times respondents said that they had made a will. But 25 per cent of the 1300 participants in the wider survey reported that their wills were out of date. The consequences of an outdated, invalid, or non-existent will are that the wishes of the deceased may not be carried out. John Ranford, legacy development officer for the Bible Society, one of the Christian Legacy group, says that this represents a huge problem. “It is estimated that around 60,000 Christians die each year, bequeathing billions of pounds. This should be a matter that each Christian commits to prayerful consideration.” Putting your affairs in order can be seen as an act of thoughtfulness akin to tidying up a room you have finished using: an active approach is needed. Intestacy rules make it risky to assume that what is left behind automatically goes to the next of kin. Trusha Velji is a solicitor with WE Solicitors in Manchester, a firm participating in this month’s annual Will Aid scheme, in which solicitors donate their fee for making a will to the charity of the client’s choice. She says that the first step for people is to calculate their assets: “People often underestimate what they are worth. A lot of people forget they have property, which is a substantial asset.” Tying up financial affairs with the help of a DIY will-writing pack is not advisable, she says. It is all too easy to overlook the vital small print. “I once had to tell someone that his beneficiary gift was invalid, as he had been a witness to the signing of the will. Legally, a beneficiary can act as executor for a person’s estate, but not as witness. The news did not go down too well.” WILL-WRITING organisations may also leave unforeseen loopholes, as they simply record the client’s wishes. Lauren Smith, a solicitor with the Will Aid participants Watson Esam in Sheffield, says: “Solicitors will ask the hard questions: ‘If your child dies before you, will you leave the bequest to your spouse?’ What if the couple have split up? It is important to put all the basics in place before any unexpected crisis.” As a regulated profession, solicitors are obliged to keep notes on client meetings. Having such information on file can be particularly valuable if someone wants to bequeath his or her assets in a way that might be perceived as unfair, Miss Smith says. “If you had given £50,000 to your daughter in your lifetime, you might wish to ‘even up’ by giving your son the first £50,000 on your death. This can be explained in a letter of wishes alongside your will. And it helps to be as clear as possible about any specific gifts people want to make, such as items of jewellery.” Although this may seem overly fussy, Miss Smith says it is vital to do as much as possible to put things beyond dispute: “It sounds horrible, but the money factor can cause a problem. I’ve seen close families completely divide over a will.” Contentious probate is on the increase, with the rise of second families and stepchildren, a harsher economic climate, and society’s greater sense of entitlement. “People may feel that a beneficiary has influenced the will, or an out-of-work sibling may feel they need more than a wealthy one,” Miss Smith says. Appointing guardians for children is a key issue: guardians need to be trusted both to care for children and receive money on their behalf. Solicitors can also set up specific legal provisions. For example, if people do not wish their offspring to inherit everything at the age of 18, executors can be authorised to release money to cover university fees, or a house deposit, as needed, until the full inheritance is realised. After a will has been made, it is a good idea to assemble a list of all financial assets, such as bank-account details, and insurance-policy details and numbers. This can be kept in a safe place, and those who need to be can be informed of its whereabouts. A copy can also be stored, together with the will, by the appropriate solicitor. “People tend not to want to do this, as they say the details will change,” Miss Smith says. “But it is a simple task to update it each year and send this to your solicitors, who will simply replace the old one in your file without charge.”Amassing such paperwork now can spare loved ones from having to rummage through personal effects to track down information later. Age Concern publishes an eight-page form to help people compile personal information for those they leave behind, from bank-account details and internet passwords to those who should be informed of the death. |
 Family ties: grieving relatives |
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THE Lasting Post website offers practical guidance on dealing with aspects of death, as well as a space to record personal wishes concerning life’s ending: informing people, legal and financial issues, funeral and memorial service.
The site’s founder, Chantal Rickards, says she wants to help people avoid her own experience of being “in a black hole without a torch” when her mother died six years ago. “She was born and died a Roman Catholic, but my father was buried in a Church of England churchyard. We felt that Mum would want to be buried next to Dad, but we had no idea whether the funeral service should be Catholic or Anglican.”
Ms Rickards and her five siblings were evenly split: three wanted a Roman Catholic service; three an Anglican. “The problem was we had no map. My mother suffered a form of Alzheimer’s in her last 18 months. We had never tackled the issue before that, and when she became irrational, it was inappropriate to do so.” In the end, the family arranged two services.
Provision for dependants aside, there is also the question of bequests. In the Christian Legacy survey, more than a third of Church Times respondents with wills had not included a charitable legacy.
While cancer-research and animal-welfare charities tend to be popular legacy beneficiaries, Mary Smith, the fund-raising manager for CMS, another Christian Legacy group member, says that Christians need to be encouraged to leave legacies to Christian organisations. “If we have exercised good stewardship throughout our lives, leaving a legacy to a Christian charity is an exciting way of continuing to give beyond our own lifetime.”
CHARITABLE legacies can be a significant resource. Last year, the Church Army’s total income of £5.8 million included more than £800,000 in legacy money. Such gifts typically range from £200 to upwards of £200,000; so those who remember the Church Army in their will are likely to be giving more after their death than during their lifetime.
Paul Fitzpatrick, the Church Army’s head of fund-raising, wants to promote legacy-giving, but is aware that the issue is a sensitive one. If people tell him that they are making a pledge, he contacts them to ensure that this is really what they wish to do, and offers advice in making wise choices. He says: “One man wanted to leave his flat for retired Church Army officers, but it was in an isolated area and not very suitable. I said it would be better to allow Church Army to sell the property and allocate the money to a fund dedicated to supporting retired officers’ care.”
Although people may have specific ideas about how they would like their legacy to be spent, being overly restrictive can cause a charity problems later. The Church Army recently completed the process of securing permission from the Charity Commissioners to use money left 50 years ago to help “wayward women”, for its work with women on the streets and in prison. “We had to establish that this was an equivalent project,” Mr Fitzpatrick says.
Miss Smith feels that where people have specific desires about the use of a legacy, these should be expressed as a wish: “This makes things clear, but the wording is not legally binding.” Pledging a percentage of an estate rather than a particular amount of money also covers any issues arising from a change in the value of assets. |
 An example of a Last Will and Testment |
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FOR a charity, a legacy can come as an unexpected blessing rather than budgeted income. This summer, the Christian Blind Mission was astonished to receive a £92,000 legacy from a Miss Gwendoline Heavens.
Isabella Eastham, CBM’s legacy officer, says: “This lady had responded to a couple of our emergency appeals with small donations. We sent her our newsletter, but had no further contact.
To us she was simply a lapsed donor.”
Miss Heavens died last year, in her late 80s, leaving money to CBM alongside other bequests to her nursing home and church.
Typically, those who leave charitable legacies tend to make multiple gifts. CBM decided to use Miss Heavens’s legacy to fund a plastic surgeon in Uganda. Ms Eastham says: “It felt appropriate. Her earlier giving was in response to emergencies.”
Christian charities want to encourage legacy-giving, and are disappointed that on Stewardship Sunday many churches fail to mention it. Ms Smith, of CMS, thinks that the clergy may feel it is insensitive, “or that people will just pick up the message about tithing and apply it to what they leave behind”.
Facing our own mortality, Ms Rickards says, is not easy. “People find it incredibly difficult to talk about, as they are so busy living their lives. But they need to confront their ending. You can leave an awful mess, with dreadful repercussions on those coming after you. When you are bereaved, your emotions are already boiling like water in a kettle. The last thing you need is more chaos.”
Ms Velji says that people can also be superstitious: “They somehow fear that making a will is going to bring their death-date forward. So they keep putting it off for another day. But then that day never comes.”
If the cost of a will is off-putting — it starts at about £80 — then the cost of not making one may be much greater, Ms Velji says. “It has just cost nearly £400 to sort out one probate issue at court with a particular will.”
And if you are still unsure about a charitable legacy, Miss Smith says that taking advantage of Will Aid means that you can at least donate now.
www.ageconcern.org.uk (Information Sheet IS18: Instructions for my next-of-kin and executors upon my death) |
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| Preparing for a funeral IN 24 years of ministry, the Revd Stephen Goodwin, Chaplain at Douglas Macmillan Hospice, in Stoke-on-Trent, says, he has conducted very few funerals where the deceased has left clear instructions. “People will say things like ‘Mum watched Songs of Praise and sang along to some hymns, but we have no idea if these were her favourites.’” Where instructions have been left, it can make all the difference, Mr Goodwin says. “The funeral feels appropriate. There’s a sense of completion and achievement.” The Revd Patrick Ellisdon, Priest-in-Charge at St Paul’s, Cliftonville, in Margate, says that in his experience those who plan ahead tend to be in stable, open family relationships, or aware that death is not far away. Messy dying arises from complicated living, where there have been more than one partner, children from different relationships, and poor or no communication between family members past and present. In such cases, Mr Ellisdon says, people “throw themselves into clergy hands for the funeral. I have even helped people fill in benefit forms when they cannot afford to pay for it.” Problems can arise when the deceased has expressed wishes counter to those of the surviving family — especially over burial versus cremation. The Revd Ben Phillips, Vicar of St John the Baptist, Bodicote, in Oxfordshire, says that people “can agonise over this decision, but it is the family who are left who have to live with what is done. However detailed the deceased’s funeral plans, the family needs to have a little liberty. The funeral should be helpful for them.” Terminal illness can bring time to consider one’s funeral wishes, and, in some cases, ensure that they can be met. The Revd Sarah Sharp, Rector of Lower Windrush, a four-parish rural benefice in Oxfordshire, says that a woman in her congregation with cancer said that she wanted to be buried in the churchyard. “I needed to tell her that she would have to go on to the electoral roll for that: our churchyard only accepts burials of parish residents or electoral-roll members. She lived in the neighbouring village.” Mr Phillips says: “Facing up to mortality can help people make the most of the time they have left. Some cope by fighting on to the last, and avoid making any plans, but the more they are willing to specify their wishes — for funeral hymns, readings, and so on — the better.” Clergy can support this process. When Mr Phillips visited a dying woman in hospital, talked with her about her funeral wishes, and wrote them down, the rest of her more distant family were profoundly grateful. When families are not reconciled, the dying person can be aware of forthcoming difficulties, but feel powerless to do anything about them. Ms Sharp says it took six months of visiting one parishioner in a hospice before she could coax him into talking about his funeral. “He had had three wives, and six children. I eventually got this conversation, with his current wife present. I had to take full authority in the funeral service itself, and say that this was how he wanted things to be. “Another issue that needs talking through is where there is a second marriage after the first partner has died. Will Dad be buried with his first or second wife? Children from the first marriage may want their mum and dad to be buried together, however well they get on with the second partner.” Mr Goodwin says that his first vicar told him: “A funeral is as important as a wedding. But we spend months planning one, and do the other in days, at a time not conducive to thinking straight.” Perhaps it is time to encourage more planning ahead. |
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