Necessary Documents for Bereavement Notification

What documents are needed to let you know of a bereavement?

If you are a next of kin, you will need the following documents:

Death certificate
Photo ID (eg. driving licence or passport)
Proof of address

You may also need a Grant of Representation (England & Wales) or Certificate of Confirmation (Scotland). We will let you know if this is required in the condolence letter.

If you are notifying us of a death outside of the UK, we'll need a certified translation.

If you are a solicitor, you will need:

Death Certificate
Law society number
If you are an un-regulated solicitor, we will require a letter of authorisation from the next of kin/executor to say that you are authorised to act on their behalf
We will need to be made aware if there is an existing will

There may be some further documents we may need to help close the accounts. If we do, we’ll let you know when we send the condolence letter.

Click on each below for more information.

Bereavement account(s) closure form

If the deceased had one or more accounts which is in credit, we’ll need the Next of Kin or executor(s) to complete, sign and return a Bereavement Account(s) Closure form. This form enables us to close the account and transfer funds. Please check everything is clear and readable before sending.

To complete this form, you’ll need to know approximately how much funds are left in the account(s). It’s okay if you don’t know this now, the initial letter we send to you will include this. You can download the Bereavement Account(s) Closure Form here (PDF, 152.7KB)

Death certificate

A death certificate is a government-issued legal document stating the date, location and cause of death.

When sending us a death certificate, please check that all signatures and seals are clear and readable.

Non-English death certificate

If you have a death certificate which is written in a language other than English, we also need to see an officially translated version. Sometimes translations can be found incorporated in the certificate itself. If not, please check the list of translations we accept

Will / Codicil

A will contains a person's wishes as to how any assets, property or care for any dependents should be handled.

A will also appoints an Executor of the will. This person will act on behalf of the estate to ensure all assets and requests are handled and distributed correctly.

By viewing the will we can be sure we are dealing with the correctly appointed person/people.

If the deceased customer left a will, we will need to see it as we can then be sure we’re dealing with the correctly appointed person/people.

A Codicil is a legal document that acts as an addition to a will. It may contain changes to the will which can be made without having to rewrite the original will.

If the deceased customer had a will/Codicil, please send us a copy ensuring the signatures are clear and readable.

Proof of identification

Proof of personal identity: We’ll need to see proof of identity from the Next of Kin or Executor to confirm we’re dealing with the correct person.

We'll need to see ID for the person we are releasing funds to before we can proceed. This ID could be a passport, or photo driving licence or OAP / concessionary travel pass. If you don't have these, we do include a full list of what we can accept in the initial letter we send you. We can accept a photo of the passport or driving licence via email, all other personal ID will need to have either a certified copy sent to us through the post, or you can take the original document into any local branch to be certified.

Please ensure images, photos and text are clear and readable.

Proof of address:

We’ll need to see proof of address from the Next of Kin or Executor to confirm we’re dealing with the correct person.

Your proof of address could be:

Original bank statement from the last 6 months
Original council bill dated in the last 12 months
Original utility bill/statement dated within the last 6 months

Please ensure images, photos and text are clear and readable.

Final funeral bill invoice

If there are sufficient funds in the deceased customer’s sole estate, we can use those funds to pay the final funeral bill.

If you would like us to do this, please send us the final funeral bill invoice. Please ensure that it's on the funeral directors headed paper.

Important:

Payment can only be made to the funeral director for the final invoice. We will be unable to reimburse you directly

Inheritance tax - IHT form

If you have to pay Inheritance Tax, we can make the payment on your behalf, subject to sufficient funds being available.

We’ll need to see a signed IHT423 form.

For England & Wales - For further help or guidance & to obtain the IHT423 form, please visit the Website - www.gov.uk/inheritance-tax.

For Scotland - For further help or guidance & to obtain the IHT423 form, please visit the website – www.mygov.scot/inheritance-tax-support.

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Sending documents

Send photos of the documents to the email address: Berdocuments@rbs.com.

Include the first name, last name and date of death of the deceased customer in the subject line. If you’ve already received your Notification Reference Number (on the condolence letter beginning with BER), please include this as well.

Please see our Sending us documents page for more guidance.

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What documents are needed to let you know of a bereavement?

What documents are needed to let you know of a bereavement?

Bereavement account(s) closure form

Bereavement account(s) closure form

Death certificate

Death certificate

Will / Codicil

Will / Codicil

Grant of probate/certificate of confirmation/ letter of authorisation

Grant of probate/certificate of confirmation/ letter of authorisation

Proof of identification

Proof of identification

Final funeral bill invoice

Final funeral bill invoice

Inheritance tax - IHT form

Inheritance tax - IHT form

Letter of renunciation

Letter of renunciation

Birth certificate

Birth certificate

Name change document(s)

Name change document(s)

Marriage certificate

Marriage certificate

Other

Other

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