Document Storage & Registration - A.R.K Lasting Powers & Wills

Will storage and registration options:

At your original appointment the subject of Will storage will be mentioned. You obviously have the option of storing your Will(s) at home, but this will not be the most safe and secure option. There will always be the risk of fire damage or destruction, theft or loss of your Will(s). The only version of a Will that can be accepted by the Probate Registry when someone has died, is an original, hand-signed and dated paper copy that has been witnessed by two people.

We therefore offer an alternative to home storage to give our clients the peace of mind of knowing that their Will is safe and secure, and that it will only be released from storage either when they request this via A.R.K. Lasting Powers & Wills, or on production of a death certificate after they have passed away.

The fee for us to arrange for your documents (Wills/Lasting Powers of Attorney etc) to be stored safely is charged on an annual basis as follows:

Safe storage of documents for a single person – £15 per annum
Safe storage of documents for a couple – £25 per annum

These amounts are inclusive of VAT and if your Will is in storage you will also recieve a 30% discount off our amendment fees if you want to amend your Will in the future.

To give you further peace of mind that your Will cannot accidentally be lost, misplaced or ignored on your death, we will also register it’s existence and storage loacation with Certainty, The National Will Register. There is a usually a one-off fee payable to Certainty for this service, but we are able to provide the service to our clients free of charge. The benefits of having your Will recorded on the register are described below.

Certainty – The National Will Register

Certainty, the National Will Register is the Law Society’s endorsed provider of a national Will Register and is chosen, endorsed and used by the public, legal profession, law firms, PI insurers, Government agencies, charities and other organisations to Register Wills and search for Wills. Certainty is the longest-established and by far the largest register in the UK. Thousands of Will writing professionals and the public use Certainty to register Wills and search for Wills prior to distributing the estate. Registering your Will is an important part of the Will making process, and you should ensure you do so with a long-standing register with impeccable credentials.

Will Registration

Certainty Will Registration is proven to protect the Testator’s beneficiaries by ensuring, their Will can be found, and their last wishes adhered to. Certainty does not disclose the existence of a Will or need to see a copy of it to register it. The existence of a Will is disclosed by the ‘holder’ (solicitor, etc) after a death has been confirmed by way of a death certificate.

How Will Registration works

Certainty does not need to see a copy of your Will to register it. Registration records the existence and tags the location of your Will on Certainty the National Will Register, so that the people you have left your estate to, or those you have chosen to be your executors, can find it when you have passed away. Registration ensures that if beneficiaries and executors are unaware that you have written a Will or forget where it’s located, it can be easily found by conducting a Register Will Search.

The existence of your Will and its location are confidential. Only when you have passed away can your Will’s location be declared. Even then, it will be disclosed only when the person searching for your Will has a genuine, bona fide interest and that person can provide a copy of your death certificate.

8 Million plus Wills

Through members of the public and legal members of Certainty, the National Will Register contains details of around 7 million Wills. At peak times a Will is registered every 2 seconds with Certainty.

How to arrange Will registration with Certainty

Unless you ask us not to, we will automatically inform Certainty of the location of your Will so that they can note their records accordingly. From then on it will be easy for your executors to establish that you do in fact have a valid Will and where it can be found. If we have arranged safe storage of your Will we will write to your executors when placing your Will into storage – so they will have that information as well.