Northern Ireland

*Updated July 2020*. NB: Information about the laws of trusts and estates is found in this jurisdictional factfile. Taxation and other matters relating to the UK are found in the UK factfile.


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• Legal system
• Inheritance and succession
• Estate planning
• Taxation
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• Other relevant information

Legal system

Common law. Northern Ireland is part of the UK but has its own separate legal system. Local laws are made by the Northern Ireland Assembly, a devolved legislature. Certain matters are reserved to the UK Parliament at Westminster. Currently, taxation is uniform throughout the UK and so reference should be made to the UK factfile.


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Inheritance and succession

Succession

Northern Ireland succession law is governed by the Administration of Estates Act (Northern Ireland) 1955 (The 1955 Act). A person who wishes to dispose of assets on death achieves this by leaving one or more testamentary instruments. The original document is called a will. Subsequent additional written documents are called codicils. In this summary, the term ‘testator’ refers to either a man or a woman.


Where a testator does not make a will, or only disposes of part of that testator’s estate by will, then the portion undisposed of passes under the intestacy rules.

A testator has testamentary freedom subject to the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) (Northern Ireland) Order 1979, discussed here.

Family law and defined inheritance rules

Yes. Succession to real and personal property of an intestate is governed by the 1955 Act, which provides for members of an intestate’s family in such a way as the intestate might have done had a will been made. The estate of an intestate is distributed according to the surviving beneficiaries. Personal chattels are defined in the 1955 Act and include, among others, vehicles, household articles and jewellery.


Although the advice of a qualified practitioner should be sought with respect to specific details, generally the distribution scheme is as follows.

• Where spouse and one child survive: spouse receives personal chattels and net value of the remaining estate up to GBP250,000 or the first GBP250,000 and one-half of the excess, and the child receives the other half of the excess.
• Where spouse and children survive: spouse receives personal chattels and net value of the remaining estate up to GBP250,000 or the first GBP250,000 and one-third of the excess, and the children divide the remaining two-thirds excess between them.
• Where spouse survives but none of deceased’s issue survive, and the parent or parents of the deceased or their issue survive: spouse receives personal chattels and the net value of the remaining estate up to GBP450,000 or the first GBP450,000 of the net value of the remaining estate together with one-half of the excess and the surviving parent or parents or their surviving issue take the remaining excess.
• Where spouse survives but no issue and no parents or their issue survive: spouse takes the whole estate.
• Where issue survive but no spouse survives: issue take the whole estate per stirpes.
• Where no issue, spouse, parents or their issue survive: next of kin according to rank take the estate.
• Where there are no surviving next of kin, the Crown takes the whole estate.

In Northern Ireland, no spouse or child has an absolute entitlement to a share of an estate, but if anyone satisfies the definition of claimant in the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) (Northern Ireland) Order 1979, this individual may be able to claim all or part of the estate. In Northern Ireland, the term spouse includes civil partners, following enactment of the Civil Partnership Act 2004, which relates to same-sex couples.

Probate process

If a deceased dies with a will, having appointed an executor, application for a Grant of Probate may be made. If the deceased has not appointed an executor or has died intestate, application for letters of administration may be made.
 In all cases, an account setting out details of the assets of the estate must be furnished to Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC).


Executors and administrators must undertake to collect all the assets of the estate and to distribute those assets in accordance with the law.


The most common forms of grant, known as grants of representation, are:

• Grants of probate issued to executors of a will.
• Letters of administration with will annexed issued to an administrator appointed by the courts, where no executor is willing or able to act or where no executor was appointed by the will.
• Letters of administration intestate, where the deceased died intestate.

HMRC do not charge any fee for processing an inheritance tax account. The Probate Office charges a fee for all grants of representation. The fee is levied at a flat rate of GBP261 regardless of the size of the estate.
 An executor or administrator is usually not entitled to charge fees for extracting a grant of representation or for administering the estate, unless a charging clause allowing the executor or administrator to charge such fees is included in the will.

Assets not requiring probate

In principle, no assets may be dealt with without a grant of representation. In practice, financial institutions may agree to hand over monies without a formal grant of representation, subject to an appropriate indemnity from the person to whom the assets are handed over. Such ‘small estates’ must be less than GBP10,000 although some financial institutions may extend this limit at their discretion.


Where the deceased before death nominated a beneficiary to obtain an asset, the asset may be passed in those circumstances. This normally applies in the case of a joint deposit account or insurance products. An individual may make a gift of assets to a beneficiary in contemplation of death. This is known as a donatio mortis causa. It applies where the deceased physically passes an asset to a beneficiary.

Certain assets, such as some pensions, death-in-service benefits, property subject to a joint tenancy, nominated assets and trust assets do not form part of a deceased person’s estate for probate purposes.


Mental capacity

Matters relating to mental capacity are governed by the Mental Health (Northern Ireland) Order 1986.

The Office of Care and Protection, part of the Family Division of the High Court in Belfast, has jurisdiction to appoint Controllers to manage the financial affairs of mentally incapacitated persons and to make statutory wills on their behalf. In contrast to the best-interests test applied in England and Wales, such applications are subject to a substituted judgment test.

The Enduring Powers of Attorney (Northern Ireland) Order 1987 enables individuals to appoint attorneys to manage their financial affairs. Should the donor of the power subsequently become mentally incapable of managing their financial affairs themselves then the attorneys must register the power with the Office of Care and Protection. Once registered, the power can continue to be used.

A new mental capacity Act, modelled largely on the Mental Capacity Act 2005 in force in England and Wales received Royal Assent in March 2016. However, the new regime introduced by the Mental Capacity Act (Northern Ireland) 2016 has yet to be implemented and the timetable for this was not known at the time of writing. 

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Estate planning

Use of trusts in estate planning

The law relating to trusts in Northern Ireland largely mirrors that of England and Wales and so reference should be made to the England and Wales factfile. Following enactment of the Perpetuities and Accumulations Act 2009 in England and Wales the principal difference between the jurisdictions is that the usual maximum perpetuity period allowable in Northern Ireland is 80 years, rather than 125 years as in England and Wales. The Settled Land Acts also still apply in Northern Ireland.

Use of foundations in estate planning

NOT APPLICABLE.

Types of entities

NOT APPLICABLE.

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Taxation

In respect of all matters of taxation, reference should be made to the UK factfile.

Key resources for further information

PUBLICATIONS

• Grattan, Succession Law in Northern Ireland (SLS, 1996)
• Kessler & Grattan, Drafting Trusts and Will Trusts in Northern Ireland, Bloomsbury 2012
• Butterworths Wills Probate & Administration Service (LexisNexis, 2006)

WEBSITES

• Probate Office: www.courtsni.gov.uk/en-gb/services/probate/Pages/ProbateInformation.aspx
• Office of Care and Protection: www.courtsni.gov.uk/en-GB/Services/OCP/Pages/default.aspx

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STEP branches in Northern Ireland

There is one STEP branch in Northern Ireland.

• STEP Northern Ireland

Members in Northern Ireland

Find STEP members in Northern Ireland using the Member Search: Search now