I met Mike Freer, the Minister responsible for Probate, following several constituents’ case of delay in processing applications. The Minister confirmed that the office had been taking many months to determine a range of probate cases, and he was working with officials to shorten delays and improve processes. He agreed we should expect a better service. He promised to review personally a couple of cases that are still outstanding for Wokingham constituents.
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December 2, 2022
Indeed this delay has been going on for years (prior to Covid) so he certainly cannot use this as an excuse, waited very many months for a very simple, straight forward, and low value estate (no property involved) some 3 years ago.
The excuse then was, we are changing the process, and moving offices.
I must say I found the telephone helpline useful for confirming the best way to answer some of the more complex questions on the probate form, which were unclear, and could have had more than one meaning.
December 2, 2022
I had to contact my clients MP before probate came through.
December 3, 2022
As you’ve brought up Probate delays may I just comment on Caveat issues? It costs just £3 to put a stop to a will with a Caveat. Anyones will. It can stop a Grant of Probate for years by delaying answering Solicitors or the Executors or simply by delaying asking for the deceased health records as in my mothers case, where the caveators Solicitor asked for a copy nearly two years after she died. Common sense screams this cannot be right but it’s the reality of vexatious caveats and needs attention. Thank you so much for your diary excerpts.
December 5, 2022
I am very grateful for John Redwood’s assistance. However, the probate registry cannot answer the question, three years ago, before the probate system was centralised probate practitioners could obtain probate within 2 weeks of submitting their application. We have had to work with an inadequate probate registry who moved the goal post to 8 weeks and now it is 16 weeks. Deaths have not multiplied by 8 in the last 3 years. Please can the CEO of the probate registry answer this simple question. As a probate practitioner I and my colleagues cannot give our clients any timescales for probate and it is totally unacceptable.
December 8, 2022
Sarah
Whilst not a Probate practitioner like yourself, I have had to deal with a few family members estates over the past few years, and I completely agree with your points, until the Probate offices were centralised, gaining Probate was a quite simple and timely matter.
Centralisation and whatever else they have done to the system, is now fraught with frustration and delay.