Tom Curran, Chief Executive, Title Research
Title Research and Certainty have formed a partnership to offer a new range of WillSearch services called WillSearch WS which brings together for the first time the research expertise of Title Research with the intelligent technology of the Certainty National Will Register.
Two new services are being provided, WillSearch Cover and WillSearch Protect.
WillSearch Cover can be used if your client cannot locate a Will for someone who has died, or thinks that a later version may exist. WillSearch Cover searches using Certainty ‘REACH’ technology that interconnects all solicitors throughout England and Wales, searches the Certainty National Will Register and places a notice on the Certainty missing Wills register. WillSearch Cover can be used to reassure your client that you have used your best endeavours to find a Will.
WillSearch Protect can be used when indemnity insurance is required to protect the Personal Representative against claims for incorrect distribution. WillSearch Protect comprises all best practice search services including research to search for a Will where none apparently exists or cannot be found. To distribute the estate safely and correctly use WillSearch Protect. WillSearch Protect insurance is underwritten by Zurich.
Is it an intestacy?
All too often Wills are deemed lost or presumed never written and are difficult to trace, near impossible some would say.
Apart from the beneficiaries anguish, not being able to find a Will has detrimental effects on the solicitor who wrote it. They do not get the opportunity to administer the Will and indeed the opportunity to take care of the testators’ beneficiaries.
A consumer survey commissioned by Certainty showed that 67% of people do not know where their parents’ Wills are located. There can be many reasons why a Will cannot be located and therefore is presumed lost or indeed never written. The passage of time, house moves and even malicious destruction are all key factors as to why the Will cannot be found when it is needed. This is extremely unfortunate when in most cases the Will is safely stored in a solicitor’s office somewhere.
According to the Law Commission, many tens of thousands of people die without a Will every year, causing human and economic costs for a large number of families when they are already financially and emotionally vulnerable.
Now searching for a Will or protecting the Personal Representative against claims for incorrect distribution should a Will emerge at a future point has never been so simple.
To find out more about
WillSearch Cover and
WillSearch Protect, call us on 020 7332 9090 or email us at
info@titleresearch.com