Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

1. You can go to a solicitor or professional Will writer. It is not very convenient and can be expensive, but you usually end up with a good quality Will.
2. At the other end of the spectrum, you can make a Will using a blank piece of paper or blank form kit. This is usually cheap or free, but often results in a Will that doesn't work when it goes through the probate process.
3. In the middle are online interactive services like the one at LegalWills.co.uk. The end product is often word-for-word identical to one prepared by a solicitor, but at about one tenth the cost.

There are no other payments required to prepare your legal Will. You can have a legal Will in your hands for £49.95 with nothing else to pay, ever.

What other options are there?
If you wish, you can have your Will reviewed by one of our solicitors for £69.00. Most people do not need this, and would not benefit from it, but if you have selected an option such as "None of the above. Let me describe in detail how to distribute my estate.", then you may want to consider this.

Your Will must first be printed, and then signed in the presence of two witnesses. If you do not have access to a printer, we can print it for you and mail it out. The cost for this is £9.95, but again, most people do not need this option.

We also offer other services like MyLifeLocker™ and a Living Will. They are not required, but they may be useful to you depending on your situation.

What about document storage?
We do not store physical documents, but we allow you to maintain an account with us if you want to update your document in the future.

The Will service costs £49.95. With this payment, you are able to prepare your Will. It also gives you one year of unlimited updates to the document. You are able to print the document as often as you wish during that first year. You can download it as a PDF or Word file, but to make your document a legal Will, it must first be printed, and then signed in the presence of two witnesses. The online version is there for your convenience only.

If you choose not to maintain an account with us after the first year, your initial payment is all you will ever pay. We do not keep credit card details on file and cannot automatically charge beyond this initial payment.

If you wish, you can choose to store your documents online for longer than a year, which will make it easier to make updates in the future to reflect any changes in your personal or financial situation (rather than returning to a solicitor each time). This is of course optional, but it does make the process of maintaining your document more convenient. £11.95 will give you one additional year of updates, or you can purchase multiple years: 5 years at £29.95, 10 years at £39.95, 25 years at £79.95 (£3.20 per year).

Every time you make an update to your Will, it must first be printed, and then signed in the presence of two witnesses again. If you choose not to maintain an account with us, you will always have your printed, signed document. If you don't need to make changes to that document, it will last you for the rest of your life, whether or not you have an account with us.

What happens if I don't maintain an account, and then in a few years I need to update it?
If your account has not been touched in years, and it is inactive, we reserve the right to remove the account. You will receive an email notification that your account might be removed. However, in practice, we have never actually removed any accounts in our over 24 years of operation.

So, in all likelihood, you will be able to simply login to your account and pay £11.95 to reactivate it. This will give you one year of unlimited updates from the date of payment. (You will not have to pay for your inactive years.)

• Help text every step of the way.   Every page of our service has additional help text to answer your questions. If you get stuck, send us an email and we can help.
  
  
• Create your Will from anywhere at any time.   Our service works on any computer, phone or tablet. Which means you can create or update your Will in the middle of the night in Timbuktu if you need to.
  
  
• Unlimited updates.   If you write your Will with a solicitor, it could be out of date by the time you get home. You don't face that issue with LegalWills.co.uk. If your circumstances change, simply login to your account, update your document, and sign your new Will. There is no charge for updates as long as you maintain a membership.
  
  
• Professional reviews by a solicitor.   Our service works for the vast majority of situations, but on occasion people have unusual circumstances and need the reassurance of a legal professional's eye. We offer this as an option.
  
  
• Our other services.   We don't just do Will writing. We offer a complete portfolio of services that will help you to plan your estate. We have the LifeLocker® executor tool, that allows you to document all of your personal details and assets, and MyVault™ that lets you upload important files. Together with our Keyholder® mechanism, you can be assured that the right information gets into the right hands at the right time (and not before).
  
  
• Privacy and security.   We do not store any information as plain text. We do not store Wills in our database. All of your information is encrypted on our servers. Nobody can access it except you and your designated Keyholders® at the appropriate time. Furthermore, we do not share, trade or sell any of your data with third parties whatsoever.
  
  

"I used your service to write a Will for my dear wife Christine who passed away this year. The Will was easy to fill out and very straightforward. I never had one problem arise because of the Will."
--- Keith Sutton   Read more testimonials

For an informative and eye-opening comparison of the MyWill™ service to do-it-yourself legal will kits, read about it here.

• "I don't really care who gets my stuff."
  If you do not have a Will, there is a legal formula that determines who receives what. It is highly unlikely to match your wishes for your estate. The courts will appoint somebody to take care of everything on your behalf, but this may not be the person that you would have chosen. The lack of direction often causes rifts between family members and loved ones who are experiencing the trauma of losing you. If you care about anybody while you are alive, you should also protect them from unnecessary anguish after you have gone by preparing a Will. The effort required to draft your Will is insignificant compared to the difficulties that dying without a Will presents to your survivors.
• "Everything will go to my spouse whether or not I write a Will."
  You are relying on the intestate laws to distribute your things. It is possible that everything will go to your spouse, but this is by no means certain, particularly if you have children. It is possible that your share of your home could go to your children instead of to your spouse. It's just not straightforward if you don't have a Will in place.
• "I have nothing to leave anybody."
  You are not writing your Will assuming that you will die today. Your Will is in place and updated throughout your life as you acquire or lose assets. You actually have no idea and no way or predicting what you will be worth when you die. Supposing you were hit by a bus today, and the bus driver was texting, your estate could sue the bus company and your estate could be worth millions of pounds.

There is never a situation where is makes sense to not have a Will. But you must write a Will when you have the capacity to write it. There is no value in waiting, and often people leave it too late. Do not plan to write a Will when you are close to dying, as this strategy won't work.

Although the MyWill™ question-and-answer wizard is applicable for most cases, we do know of certain situations where we would recommend that you seek the advice of a legal professional.  In particular:

• If you are a resident of Northern Ireland or Scotland.
• If you are involved in a matrimonial dispute, or wish to disinherit your spouse or children.
• If you have a history of mental illness, or the question of your mental capacity may be raised in objection to the statements in the Will.
• If you own personal property or real estate in multiple countries.
• If you are under 18.
• If you have complicated business investments (e.g. you are part owner of property or businesses where ownership may be challenged).
• If you have a large, complex estate and feel that you would benefit from some advice on tax reduction.
• If you need to provide for long term medical care for a dependent or a child with special needs.
• If you think that somebody may challenge your Will in court.

In any of the above situations and in other more complex situations (the above is not an exhaustive list), we would recommend that you seek the advice of an estate planning solicitor.

• Fire detection and fire suppression systems with dry pipe pre-action sprinkler systems
• N + 1 redundant power supplies, providing dual power feeds and backup batteries, water coolant systems and generators
• N + 1 redundant climate control, providing primary and backup chiller units, cooling towers, and water storage
• Local network operations center (NOC) for monitoring all data center operations
• 24x7 monitoring and support of network connection and server availability
• 24x7 uniformed guard service with interior and exterior closed-circuit television surveillance
• Electronic access at all data center entrances, including biometric hand scanners
• Electronic key management systems and individually keyed cabinets

As you can see, we take the security and privacy of all of our member information very seriously.