New emerging LawTech businesses entering the world of Wills and probate sector are shaking the industry up by substantially undercutting traditional probate solicitors’ fees.
As more and more competition enters the market, bringing technological advances, driving costs down, it will open up different avenues and more options to consumers when dealing with the probate process.
An example of new competition in the market is UK’s largest will-writing service, Farewill, who has launched a free advice line for families dealing with probate, along with a set-fee service that cuts the cost of probate by thousands.
Last December, the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) launched new transparency rules which required firms to publish price and service information around their probate offering and other services. Since launching, the SRA launched their own investigation which revealed 75% were not compliant with the rules.
Farewill state that 280,000 families are paying up to £18k unnecessarily for probate each year with one in five UK solicitors not complying with legal rules on probate. They believe 100,000s of families are losing up to a fifth of their inheritance to the UK’s unfair probate system.
The probate process can be complicated, and in many cases very time-consuming. Probate is a document which unlocks a person’s assets and is needed after half of all deaths. Estate administration is the legal process after a death to sort out someone’s affairs from start to finish, like closing accounts and paying beneficiaries.
Farewill state that families could be paying £595 for help with probate or up to £18,000 for full estate administration. They believe the problem is that the options aren’t clearly understood or laid out – and the SRA investigations show, many in the industry are still shying away from transparency.
Due to the rising costs, Farewill has launched a fixed fee probate service, costing £595 for simple estates and £1,045 for complex cases. This service is 100% transparent and 3x less expensive than the most basic offering from a solicitor. The team at Farewill will also talk to anyone through the process of obtaining probate, free of charge.
Dan Garrett, CEO and co-founder of Farewill, says:
“Farewill wants to fly the flag for grieving families by offering a more supportive and transparent alternative to dealing with probate.
“Navigating the red-tape, banks and complexities involved in probate already creates a huge strain for families during some of the most difficult periods of our lives. When we speak to bereaved relatives, we hear varied experiences. Some instructed professionals to do the full estate administration and regret it – in hindsight, they felt they could have done it themselves. But others do it themselves and wish they had more support, because of the worry of getting something wrong, or because it can be so time-consuming.
“The problem is that the options aren’t clearly understood or laid out – and the industry isn’t in a rush to change. We wanted to take a different, transparent approach when we built our probate service.
“When you call us for the first time, the first thing we’ll do is help you work out if you need professional help. We never assume you do.
“If using our probate service, our technology means we’re able to offer a faster, cheaper, expert option that’s been designed with the customer in mind – unlike many options available today. We’re proving that technology can transform the experience of wills and probate”.
We asked Seb Shakh, CEO at lovelegal.com to comment on how probate professionals can improve and speed up their processes and reduce their costs for their probate offering. He said:
“While technology is bringing a new age of legal services, including more accessible and lower cost offerings in contrast to traditional models, this doesn’t necessarily need to be seen as a threat to traditional practices. Law firms should already be used to adapting and evolving their processes or new ways of doing business due to the waves of regulation changes introduced over the years. It’s therefore important for them to adjust and realise the benefits technology has to offer in order to stay competitive”
