Bank ignoring estate debt payment order after death?

[BungleBungle]

My mother passed away last month. She had an unsecured loan from Yorkshire Bank for about £6000. She also had her current account with them, with about £900 in it.

 

 

They have now taken the money from the current account to pay off a proportion of the loan.

 

 

Isn't this entirely illegal? I thought the rules of debts to be paid from an estate were (from direct.gov):

 

1. the funeral expenses and 'testamentary' expenses (those to do with dealing with the will);

2. any debt secured by a mortgage on a property;

3. HM Revenue and Customs;

4. the Department of Work and Pensions, who deal with social security (you may have to refund any over-payment of benefits);

5. unpaid pension contributions or wages.

 

 

The total estate won't even cover the funeral expenses, and so surely the money from that current account, legally, must go to partially pay those costs?

[DeRichleau]

Looks like the bank has used the right of offset. Realistically if there is no value to the estate, it will not make a great deal of difference.You are right though I agree it's probably illegal, and if you have the time while mourning and burying your mother, then give them some grief.

[IdaInFife]

when my sister passed she had two accounts with the same bank - one in credit and one much more in debit. It was them that told me to send them a statment from the funeral direcotrs and they would pay the credit balance direct to them.

 

Maybe a short letter to them stating that the credit in the account is needed to pay towards the funeral costs and ask them to forward a cheque to the FD's and inlcude a copy on an invoice from them.

 

Ida x

[BungleBungle]

Hello all,

 

Just a quick thankyou to everyone here.

 

I've now had written confirmation from 3 different banks, and had the total £22,000 of debt owed by my late mother written off.

 

Even though this was what legally should have happened..... it was quite a fight, and required a hell of a lot more effort than unsecured loans for the deceased should require.

 

If it wasn't for the info here, I wouldn't know my legal rights, and the banks were certainly not going to tell me them (apart from HSBC, who were excellent, bar their harassing phone calls because the departments didn't communicate).

 

Thanks everyone!