Probate Q - Australia

[Ozzie Dave]

Just quick question that I hope someone in the know might have an answer. A relative recently passed away, far from a huge estate, however for nursing home reasons we need to obtain probate, he had 2 daughters and its a 50/50 simple share. I have received their first invoice and was surprised to find a number of instances of " instruct colleagues" and it shows 8 different legal staff involved. to me this seems excessive is it just me? Company doing it is a small company.

[Pro Bono]

Your question isn't exactly clear, but assuming you're talking about a firm of lawyers then yes, involving 8 different people in the probate process is clearly absurd, and an exercise in fee inflation.

However, it's the executors of the Will that make the decision whether or not to employ lawyers to handle the estate, so they're the ones who should either complain to the firm or (probably better) just de-instruct them.

[Ozzie Dave]

12 people over 4 small local offices,will is between 2 daughters, one named as executor. complaint is being lodged with the head of the group as they have lost 4 staff and we were billed for them instructing the replacements and for having to resubmit documents multiple times. We also had to point out probate application had an incorrect name for one of the daughters- I wait to hear the response as they dont want to make waves at this point of time. many thanks.