Where there's a will
Huddersfield Daily Examiner
Wednesday, July 12th, 2006
Where there ’s a will…
A NATIONAL register was being launched today to tackle the problem of wills found to be missing or damaged when a person dies. An estimated one in four wills is found to be lost or damaged on the death of the author — sometimes by relatives hoping for a larger share of the inheritance.
Some European countries have official.systems which allow people to store their wills in a safe place and record the details on a national register. A UK company has been set up to offer a similar online service to register, locate and retrieve wills.
Liverpool-based thewillplace.com will issue a certificate and two credit card-style registration cards — one to be held by the wiH author and one by their next-of-kin — showing a unique account number and contact details for thewillplace. com
Will professionals who register with the service can then, on production of a death certificate, search thewillplace.com database to retrieve the will details.
The firm's director, Geoffrey Prince, said: "Our system is secure, so only registered, authorised professionals can access information."