How is inheritance tax collected? Would one of G Brown's spies be present at the will reading or would you be

Question

expected to declare it yourself?

Answer 1

There watching...always watching!..
I think the solicitor who reads the will has to declare it for you so you cant not pay!

Answer 2

ok number one you dint need a solicitor to administer an estate for probate, the courts service will supply all the forms and they are available on line. the executors will complete the probate forms which will be passed to the capital taxes office if it is over the £285,000 limit for IHT and probate will not be granted till the IH bill is paid. if IHT is payable on the estate then it may be worth talking to a solicitor who is a STEP member ( society of trust and estate planning) they are specialists at looking at wills in order to reduce if possible any IHT due, remember that even after death a will can be re-written to make it more tax efficient. or talk to a fee charging IFA who will give you some options. but yes you have to effectively self declare the tax and they will cut very important bits off if you tell any fibs.

Answer 3

Whatever the will may contain, you won't get your hands on a penny of it until the will has been cleared by the Probate Office. It is the Form of Probate that you punt around the banks, building societies and land registry, not the will itself and the Probate Office will inform the Treasury of anything that might attract Inheritance Tax.

Answer 4

Unless the estate is very small, in which case inheritance tax wouldn't apply, the executor would have to apply for probate. I had to do this for my mother's estate , however she didn't leave enough for it to be taxed.
Presumably the probate office would inform the treasury.

Answer 5

You'd think he would do that, wouldn't you? Sort of fitting, don't you think?

Any estate that is subject to IHT (simply on account of its size and the likelihood of it containing real estate) will have to be handled by a solicitor. It would be more trouble than it is worth for the solicitor not to report it.

Answer 6

you can't collect anything of value from the will 'till it is cleared by probate. if the will contains anything of interest to G Brown, the probate office will definitely rat on you - thats what it's there for.