Winding Up Life Interest Trust - A Mess

[Swalker]

My great-grandmother left her property to me (and seven other great-grandchildren) in a trust which gave my grandmother the income and was to be distributed on my grandmother's death. My grandmother died in 2000 and the final money still has not been distributed and I (and the other beneficiaries) are at my wits end with the lawyers.

Now, the lawyers are refusing to speak to me as they say that the trustee (a cousin I have never met) is the client. But is this true? I would have thought that the trust no longer exists, so the beneficiaries are the clients? They have told me that the trust no longer exists which is why they have not prepared annual accounts for the last eleven years. (They have found it hard to account for all of the monies as a result...)

Can anyone tell me what kind of legal limbo we are in, and whether there is anything we can do about it? We don't want to sue as the remaining money isn't worth it, but I would like this to be finally finished.

[Lee Young]

Complain direct to the office for the surpervision of solicitors - that tends to get our attention!

[Swalker]

Currently the firm are refusing to deal with the Legal Ombudsman because they say I am not their client. I am at my wits end.

[Lee Young]

Instruct a solicitor to write to them to request progress, failing which an action will be brought in the Chancery Division of the High Court for general directions, for the removal of the trustees, for the provision of information and accounts and reserve the right to sue the solicitors and their advisers personally for any loss to the trusts assets that has occurred over the last few years under when it has been under their control. The solicitor should also indicate that the letter should be treated as one of professional complaint and a claim (against their PI insurance).

[pqtaxation]

There is FYI an association for solicitors and barristers who specialise in contentious trusts and probates whose website is at

http://www.actaps.com/membership.cfm

If you go to the members tab you can search by area to find a solicitor near you who can visit with your paperwork for an inital view.

[section 44]

the trustee (a cousin I have never met)

Why should they have to deal with Swalker? Am I missing the point here?

[Swalker]

Thanks for all of this advice. I will use that list and find a specialist locally, thank you.

Section 44 - I don't think there is any reason why the solicitors should have to deal with me. Except perhaps to avoid a complaint and get the whole sorry saga wound up. We have been trying to deal with them amicably for years to get it sorted. The individual solicitor concerned has had to deal with me, not least because he has no idea where some of the shares have gone and had to borrow my paperwork to discover what was distributed when.

If you are suggesting that we would have better been communicating via the trustee, he has had nothing to do with it for several years, and did not even know it still existed when one of the other beneficiaries contacted him last year.

As far as I can see, the Legal Ombudsman does have to deal with us, because beneficiaries of a will or trust are allowed to make complaints under the scheme, but they are currently disputing this,

Thanks again for all the suggestions.

[pqtaxation]

Hi Swalker

Your first post asking for help said the trustee is a cousin who presumably was a co-beneficiary (co-remainderman) of yours of the assets to be appointed out following on from your grandmother’s death in 2000.

You last post seems to indicate that last year when contacted that trustee thought his trusteeship had been completed satisfactorily, the trust assets appointed out to the beneficiaries (including himself?) and therefore nothing remains for him or the solicitors he instructed to do. It isn’t clear from your posts why he seems to have that view and you clearly have a very different view.

My reaction to reading your last post is to suggest that you go back to that trustee(s) (your cousins(s)) and speak to him about what has happened and what issues you believe there are still remain to resolve with the solicitors who he instructed to act for him. If those solicitors have not performed their duties satisfactorily then surely he has the same problems with them as you do.

Explain to him that it is the trustee(s) personally against whom that your solicitor would take action. That should hopefully cause him to take an interest in your queries and, if necessary, seek to resolve them with the solicitors who acted for him and by whom (and their professional indemnity insurers) he would seek to be indemnified against your claim.

[Swalker]

Hello pq,

Thanks for your help with this. The trustee is a cousin on the other side of the family (grandmother's brother's child) and so is not a beneficiary. When I said that he had no idea that the trust was still going on, it's more an indication to his hands-off approach than anything else! I don't think he'd communicated with the solicitor concerned for years.

The vast majority of the assets have been distributed. I am still owed in the region of £8k, but don't know if this is the same for the other beneficiaries, I think they may have a bit less remaining. The main issue is that we'd just like it sorted; quite apart from the money, it costs accountancy fees (the R185 regularly arrives 3 days before the tax deadline and takes a lot of requesting) and it is taking up time and headspace that I could quite happily use for other things.

I am quite sure that the cousin trustee knows that he is personally liable, and that is why he thinks that everything is fine.

We have been trying to avoid the lawyer route, as there is a risk that all of the remaining assets would be eaten up in the fight, but that may be the only way left open to us if the Legal Ombudsman can't help.

Thanks again.

[section 44]

Sounds to me like the starting point should ascertaining whether the trustee has acted in breach of trust.