In 1977 two very important events took place, the Queen celebrated her Silver Jubilee and David’s grandfather wrote his Will. 16 years ago David’s grandfather died intestate. However David has never given up his quest to find his grandfather’s Will. David comments, “Finding the Will was never about the money. This was all about being able to fill a gap in my knowledge about my Grandad and about who I was and where I came from. With it we could draw a line in the sand. It also helped my brother complete the family tree he’d been working on.”

Faced with a problem his memory couldn’t help him resolve and keen to bring closure to an emotionally trying experience, David contacted certainty.co.uk. He was sceptical about the chances of finding the Will because his grandfather had died 16 years ago. But this scepticism swiftly turned into optimism and hope.

The Certainty search team first checked the Certainty national Will register. This initial search quickly found that David’s grandfather’s Will was not registered. Certainty then performed a ‘Will Search Cover’ which uses cutting-edge technology to connect solicitors around the country and issues a ‘missing wills notification’. Within a very short time, Certainty unearthed the missing Will. David continues, “I thought this was so exciting; really magical. Lo and behold this Will had been in the solicitor’s office for 34 years. Then, suddenly there it was – a piece of my history”.

“This sort of Will search service can be life-changing. It takes something that’s a dry intellectual pursuit and turns it into a human, emotional experience.” Nigel McGinnity, co-founder of Certainty, added: “Sadly, David’s story is all too common. There are many cases of Wills that haven’t been registered and can’t be found. We know this is a big problem
and that’s why Certainty exists.”

I have recently scoured my Fathers house from top to bottom looking for his missing will as he recently passed on. I’m pretty sure he wrote a will as he mentioned that the only item that was specifically leaving to one of the children was a piano which he was going to leave to my brother.

This isn’t the reason for needing to find the missing will obviously as my brother is more than welcome to have the piano but as I’ve discovered a missing will in certain financial situations is going to leave us in the hands of the rules of intestate. We have been told that if you find yourself in a situation of a missing will there are a number of action steps you should take. One is to search the deceased house although in our case I know my Father kept a lot of important documents in a briefcase and this briefcase went missing after a recent burglary.

You can run a search with the national will register or you can try the probate register. To cover all bases I am currently doing all of this.

Be Safe and use Certainty to register a will on the UK’s National Will Register.

I am at a total loss what to do next. My husband recently passed on and his Will is I believe missing. I am aware that he made a Will in 1988 which I was not included in as we were not married until 1989. He informed me sometime after the marriage that he’d taken it upon himself to make a new Will and that the solicitor had advised that they could draw up a ‘mirror will’ and that I should visit my solicitor to arrange this.

Being new to the area I was unaware which solicitors he used. Needless to say there are hundreds within a 10 mile radius of us and he also worked in the City. My problem is that in that year we also relocated to a different area which means I didn’t really have the ease to locally visit the original solicitor and complete the mirror will – whatever that is!

When he passed on, I informed his stepdaughter that the missing Will was definitely not in the house and would have been relocated with us when we moved. She has now informed me that there isn’t a missing Will as she infact has a will dated 1988. I have a somewhat acrimonious relationship with my stepdaughter and to be frank her Father did too!

The fact that I do not have a Will to supersede the Will that my stepdaughter claims she has and did not name me as a benefactor means that I will only be entitled to part of the estate when I know that the subsequent Will would have categorically stated that I would have been entitled to all of the estate.

Be Safe and use Certainty to register a will on the UK’s National Will Register.