Who to notify when someone dies: the full list

After a death, a surprising number of organisations need to be told, and most of them will not find out unless you tell them. The government part is one phone call, Tell Us Once. The rest is a list, and this is the list, in the order that matters, with what each will ask for. Cross them off as you go; the notebook is the right tool.

Step 1: the people

Immediate family first, then the wider family and friends, then the person’s own circles: their church or community, their clubs, their neighbours, the people they saw every week. A single message to a group is fine and is how most families do it now. Ask one relative to take on part of the list so that it is not all yours.

Step 2: register the death

Everything below needs the death certificate, so the registration comes before the calls. How to register a death covers the appointment, and buy the certified copies there.

Step 3: Tell Us Once, for the government

One report, online or by phone, with the reference number the registrar gives you, tells HMRC, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Passport Office, the DVLA, the local council, the state pension and the public sector pension schemes. It is available in England, Scotland and Wales, and the reference lasts 28 days. How Tell Us Once works explains what it covers and what it does not. In Northern Ireland the Bereavement Service tells the benefit and pension offices in one call, and the rest are told separately.

Step 4: money, in the first fortnight

• Banks and building societies. Each will freeze an account in the person’s sole name and keep a joint account open. They will want a certified copy of the death certificate and, later, the grant of probate or letters of administration before releasing the money. Some will pay the funeral director’s invoice directly from a frozen account on sight of it, though none is obliged to before probate, so ask. What happens to a bank account when someone dies covers the freeze, joint accounts and the probate limits in full.
• Pension providers, private and workplace. Some pay a lump sum to a nominated person and some pay a survivor’s pension; both need to be told to stop the payments and start the right ones.
• Insurers: life, home, car, travel, pet. A life policy pays on the death certificate. A car policy has to be cancelled or transferred; the car cannot be driven on the person’s policy.
• Mortgage lender or landlord. The lender needs to know who is now responsible for the payments. A landlord needs to know about the tenancy, and a council or housing association tenancy has its own succession rules.
• Credit cards, loans and any debts. Debts do not die with the person; they are paid from the estate, and the executor should stop interest accruing by telling the lender.

Step 5: the employer and the professions

• The employer, for the final salary, any death-in-service benefit and the workplace pension. If the person was self-employed, their accountant and HMRC’s self-assessment, which Tell Us Once covers.
• Their GP, dentist and optician, so that appointments and reminders stop. The hospital tells the GP, but not the rest.
• Their solicitor, who may hold the will.
• Any professional body or trade union, which may have a benevolent fund.

Step 6: the house

• Gas, electricity, water, phone, broadband, to close or transfer the accounts. Take meter readings on the day of the death if you can.
• TV Licensing, which Tell Us Once does not cover and which is the organisation most often forgotten.
• Council tax, which Tell Us Once does cover, and which gives a discount or an exemption for an empty property.
• Home insurance, which may lapse if the house is empty for more than a set number of days; tell the insurer the house is unoccupied.
• Subscriptions and deliveries: newspapers, milk, streaming, the gym, charities collecting by direct debit.

Step 7: the mail and the online accounts

• The Bereavement Register and the Mailing Preference Service stop most direct mail addressed to the person, which otherwise arrives for years.
• Royal Mail redirection to the executor’s address, for the letters that matter.
• Email, social media and online accounts. Most have a memorialisation or closure process on request from the family with a death certificate. Passwords found in the person’s papers make this much easier, and it is worth looking before closing anything.

Step 8: the ones people forget

The passport and driving licence, which Tell Us Once cancels but which should be sent back or destroyed; the blue badge; the library; a season ticket or a railcard; a bus pass; the electoral register, which Tell Us Once covers; the people the person cared for, a neighbour they shopped for or a pet that needs a home.

If you cannot face the calls

Give the list to a relative, or to a friend who has asked what they can do; this is exactly the job for them. Several banks and utilities now accept notification through a single online service that some solicitors and funeral directors provide, and it is worth asking. And there is no deadline on most of this list beyond the first fortnight. What to do when someone dies puts the whole of it in order, with the three things that do have a deadline.