Finders, the international professional probate genealogists (otherwise known as ‘heir hunters’), are today reminding solicitors of the vital importance of using probate genealogists or ‘heir hunters’ for international beneficiaries searches.
Online searches and phone books can start the process but the complications of foreign privacy laws, language barriers and previously undiscovered beneficiaries place an extra burden on solicitors. The specialist expertise that heir hunters, like Finders, offer can relieve the burden to solicitors, especially sole practitioners, of tracing lost heirs.
Finders warn that the expert country-by-country knowledge held by heir hunters is needed to navigate the complex legal systems. For example, some countries including Australia, a country with over 1 million British expats according to the 2006 census, have privacy laws which differ state to state.
Even tracing heirs north of the English border can hugely increase the time involved in administering an Estate. Scottish law decrees that when a person dies intestate, the Estate is distributed according to the eldest degree of kin. This can result in solicitors tracing a large number of descendents of Great-Grandparents.
Commenting, Daniel Curran, Managing Director of Finders, said:
“Time zones, languages and expense exponentially increase the difficulties for solicitors tracing beneficiaries internationally, as well as the added complications of different legal systems. Further to that, an expert knowledge of both the country law and probate genealogy is an essential requirement, particularly in places like Canada where solicitors are denied access to individual’s records if they are not a family member.
“Heir hunters, Finders, work alongside solicitors to free up their time and resources while preventing the estate from reverting to the Crown, making what could be a stressful labour-intensive search into a professional borderless heir hunt.”
To find out more about Finders please visit the Finders website at www.findersuk.com or www.trace-people-online.co.uk. Please direct any queries to Elora Feiner on 020 7067 0257 or efeiner@webershandwick.com
