Frequently Asked Questions

This service is suitable if your will and estate is to be governed by Scots law. If you are living outside of Scotland for work for example, and return to Scotland, you can still use this service.

One of the benefits of our service is that your will and/or power of attorney is being handled by a team of qualified solicitors. Once you have given us your instructions online, we will make sure that your tailor-made documentation is what you want and need. This will involve a call to confirm the information given by you in your online questionnaire form and a meeting with you to have your final documents signed. Your documents will be sent to you for review within ten working days of speaking with us, and then we’ll meet with you to sign them as soon as you are able to.

Yes. The benefit of this service is that we will gather all of the information that we need from you via your online questionnaire form. We then confirm this information with you over a quick call. When it comes to meeting with us to sign your final documents, if you are unable to meet at one of our offices, we will discuss alternative options with you to find the most convenient solution for you.

COVID-19 UPDATE: In these unprecedented times, following the guidance outlined by The Law Society of Scotland, all face-to-face meetings will be replaced by a suitable alternative, such as a video call. This will be discussed fully with you at an appropriate time.

Yes, if you apply online today for a will, power of attorney and living will with us you will be eligible for a 20% discount. If you apply for a will and power of attorney at the same time you will be eligible for a 15% discount.

Our easy to use cost calculator provides an indicative cost for each individual based on the services they are looking for, please access the Will and Powers of Attorney Cost Calculator.

Please get in touch via email at willsbybrodies@brodies.com, or give us a call on our free phone number 0330 094 5471, and one of our team will be happy to help.

You should receive an email from Wills by Brodies attaching a copy of your completed questionnaire within 30 minutes of completing the application. If you have not received this, please check your junk mail folder.

If you still haven’t received an email, please contact us directly on 0330 094 5471 or willsbybrodies@brodies.com

If you would like to book an early (before 9am) or late (after 5pm) telephone appointment, please select the earliest or latest time on the telephone booking form (which comes up at the end of the questionnaire and after you have paid for the services) on the day you wish to have the call and then email us at willsbybrodies@brodies.com to let us know the time you would prefer to have the call. We will do our best to accommodate your requested time and if that is not possible, we will provide alternative times for you to choose from.

All you need to get started:

• Names, addresses and dates of birth for the people you wish to appoint as executor, guardian, beneficiary or attorney;
• As estimated value of your home and any outstanding mortgage;
• An estimated value of your other assets including savings, investments, business assets, investment properties, life assurance policies, pensions and any foreign assets;
• Names of any charities you wish to leave a legacy to; and
• A credit or debit card to pay online.

You should have a will if you would like to decide who receives your assets following your death.

If you die without a will (known as dying ‘intestate’), it is the law that decides how your estate is distributed.

This means that those closest to you may get nothing and those you do not wish to benefit may get it all.

Having a will allows you to choose who will receive your assets following your death and in what proportions. If you have assets that you wish to leave to a particular person, you need a will to do this.

A will can also provide great flexibility and allow you to leave assets in a trust in order to protect them for that individual, for example, you may want to leave part of your estate to young children.

If you have children under the age of sixteen, your will can name a guardian to be appointed to look after your children in the event of your death.

Read our guide on why you should have a will:

Ten reasons you should have a will

Generally it may be necessary to update your will following a lifetime event, such as the birth of children or grandchildren.

Your will should be updated when you feel it no longer accurately reflects your wishes. Updating your will is usually a straightforward process.

If you wish to make any changes to your will, please contact one of our solicitors who will be able to assist you.

We would recommend that everyone has a will. It provides certainty on how your estate is distributed, regardless of what assets you have, and it makes the administration process easier.

Many people are more comfortable with leaving percentages or parts of their estates to their chosen beneficiaries rather than leaving specific amounts. This can be discussed with your solicitor who will assist you with finding the most appropriate solution.

Joint applications are only suitable for married couples, civil partners, or cohabiting couples and where instructions ‘mirror’ each other. For example, if you and your spouse wish to prepare a will to provide for each other on the first death and your children on the second death, this would be mirror instructions.

Joint applications are not suitable for any other relations such as siblings or parent and child. The reason for this is that we provide you with tailored legal advice based on your individual circumstances. It is likely that your financial or other circumstances will vary from your relative even if your instructions are similar. This means a separate application is required as the advice we provide to each of you will be different.

If you select the option within the questionnaire to discuss the possibility of including a trust in your will, we shall discuss this with you during the initial telephone meeting. You will be charged at the end of the questionnaire for a ‘trust will’ (£360 inclusive of VAT for a single application and £420 inclusive of VAT for a joint application). If you decide not to proceed with a trust, we will refund the difference in cost.

Incapacity can result from an illness but it can also result from an accident. We therefore recommend that everyone should have a power of attorney. A power of attorney allows you to choose who your attorneys are and what powers they have when acting on your behalf.

In the absence of a power of attorney, a guardianship order is required if an individual becomes incapable. This involves a Court procedure and is less flexible, more time consuming and significantly more expensive.

An attorney is someone you trust to make decisions about your finances and your welfare in the event you are incapable of looking after yourself and your own affairs.

A power of attorney is divided into two categories:

Continuing powers – this allows someone to deal with financial matters such as operating a bank account on your behalf or buying and selling property.

Welfare powers – this allows someone to deal with welfare matters such as making decisions about where you would live and what hospital treatment you may require.

You can have a combined power of attorney which includes both continuing and welfare powers, or you can have separate powers of attorney to deal with continuing and welfare powers separately.

You can have a combined power of attorney which includes both continuing and welfare powers, or you can have separate powers of attorney to deal with continuing and welfare powers separately.

Once the power of attorney has been signed, it is recommended that the document be registered with the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG). The power of attorney can only be used once it has been registered. Therefore, if the document is unregistered and is required at short notice in the future, there can be delays associated with registering the power of attorney. These delays can be avoided by registering the power of attorney with the OPG after signing.

An executor is a person or organisation (such as a company) that is appointed in your will. Your executor is primarily responsible for ingathering, administering and thereafter distributing your estate in accordance with the terms of your will.

Survivorship clauses (or special destination clauses) are conditions that commonly appear in the title of property held by two or more people, usually spouses. The effect of such clauses is that when one person dies their, interest automatically transfers to the surviving title holder, regardless of the terms of the deceased’s will.

This can therefore cause difficulties if you want a particular asset (or your share of a particular asset) to pass to someone else named in your will. A survivorship destination can be removed or “evacuated” and this provides more flexibility with the distribution of your estate

A living will (also known as an advance directive) provides that where you are unable to communicate or take part in deciding on your medical treatment as a result of serious physical illness or mental incapacity, you wish that your life should not be sustained by artificial means and medical treatment should be limited to keeping you comfortable and free from pain.