While executors handling an estate already have plenty to manage, the cost of applying for probate has just added another spanner in the works.
From 13 July, the standard probate application fee has jumped from £300 to £526 – a rise of 75 per cent.
Why have fees risen?
The Ministry of Justice attributes the rise to a cost recovery measure. Of the £226 increase, officials say the additional revenue will go towards inflation and ongoing investment in the probate service.
While fees have increased for probate applications, the admin fees have been reduced. The fee for requesting extra copies of probate documents alongside an application is being lowered from £16 to £2.
Smaller estates hit the hardest
Estates worth under £5,000 will continue to pay nothing for probate. Everything above that threshold moves straight to the new £526 fee, with no tapering in between.
That flat threshold means the impact is felt disproportionately by smaller estates. An estate worth just over the £5,000 mark ends up paying a much larger share of its total value in fees than a substantial estate does.
Our fees remain fixed
Rising government costs are one thing, but you can be assured they won’t affect our own charges.
Despite changes from the Ministry of Justice, our probate service fees will remain exactly as they were before this announcement.
Bereavement is difficult enough and the last thing families want is to untangle fee changes and legal jargon at the same time.
If you are acting as an executor or supporting someone who is, please book a consultation with our specialists so we can talk you through what these changes mean in practice.
