Epoq.co.uk Legal Services News

Content update: Epoq have today added a series of new Rapidocs templates to the range of Rapidocs templates available to our customers.  The documents are found in our new Probate application pack, and the details are as follows:

When someone dies, it is normally the task of relatives or friends of the deceased to “administer the estate”. This can be a daunting task at a very sensitive time. It involves obtaining information about the deceased’s property and debts, collecting in the deceased’s property, settling any outstanding debts of the deceased, completing tax returns and paying any inheritance or other tax that may be due, and dealing with any remaining property in the way required by any Will left by the deceased or, if there is no Will, in accordance with other rules.

The first step is to find out about the deceased’s property and affairs.  The pack includes a series of letters that can be written to banks/building societies, mortgage companies, loan/credit card companies, etc. for information concerning money owed by the deceased.

Once this information has been obtained and the appropriate Inheritance Tax return submitted (and any tax paid), an application must be submitted to the court for permission to deal with the deceased’s property and affairs.  Until this permission is obtained, the deceased’s estate is frozen.  The permission is called a grant and can either be a grant of probate, if there is a Will, or a grant of letters of administration, if there is no Will.  This pack includes the one application form, Form PA1, which is required in order to obtain a grant and detailed step-by-step guidance as to its completion and the application process.

Documents included

1. PA 1 – Probate application form
2. Probate letter to bank and building society
3. Probate letter to annuity provider
4. Probate letter to investment provider
5. Probate letter to life insurance company
6. Probate letter to credit card or loan company
7. Probate letter to mortgage company
8. Probate letter to pension provider
9. Probate letter to share provider
10. Probate letter to utility company
11. Beneficiary receipt

If you are an existing Epoq customer and are interested in supplying this pack through your service, please contact your account or project manager in the first instance.

This week sees the launch of two new documents into the Rapidocs library, a ‘change of name deed for a minor’ and a ‘limited liability partnership agreement’.

A recent news article highlighted a number of pending court cases in New Zealand where children are fighting for the right to change their names having been graced with names such as Sex Fruit, Number 16 Bus Shelter, O.Crnia and Midnight Chardonnay. Despite such a bizarre trend in the UK, changing the name of a minor is still a common occurrence, for a variety of reasons. Our change of name deed for a minor makes it easy to change the name of a child, provided that you have parental responsibility for that child and any other person who also has parental responsibility gives consent to the change of name. This document is only suitable for minors (i.e. under the age of 18 in England, Wales and Northern Ireland and under the age of 16 in Scotland) and British citizens. Children over the age of 16 will also need to give consent to the change of name by signing in both his/her new and old name.

A limited liability partnership has elements of both a partnership and a corporation, and is a unique entity in its synthesis of both collective and individual rights and responsibilities, while being a particularly flexible business structure. This document creates a limited liability partnership agreement (LLP) in accordance with the Limited Liability Partnerships Act 2000 and provides a contractual framework under which the members should conduct themselves at all times. The agreement includes provisions in relation to the key elements that define an LLP such as management, finances and member regulation. In addition, the agreement offers many optional clauses such as those in relation to insurance, maternity, paternity and adoption leave. This document is suitable for small to medium sized limited liability partnerships of no more than 20 members. Please note that this can only be used for LLPs consisting of individual members, and not companies or other LLPs.

Both of these documents are now part of the Rapidocs library, and available for our customers to access.

As part of our continual drive to both improve and augment the range of document services we offer through our platform, we are pleased to announce the addition of a new range of landlord services to our legal content range.

It is vital that landlords are aware of the correct course of action in the event that a tenant(s) needs to be evicted, as taking the law into your own hands can land them with a heavy fine or even a prison sentence. Our new service is designed to guide customers safely through the potential minefield of being a landlord in England and Wales, making sure you tick all the procedural boxes along the way.

The new services cover everything a landlord needs to legally evict a tenant and regain possession of their property: although there are many reasons to evict a tenant(s), the two most commonly used grounds are rent arrears and the accelerated possession procedure, the latter being the preferred way to remove existing tenants and replace them with new ones paying rent.

These new services can be found across Epoq’s own sites and are available to all of our clients.