Regulation of the Willwriting Profession

BBC Panorama: Wills - The Final Rip-Off?

On Monday 9th August 2010, BBC Panorama broadcast a programme on the Willwriting Profession.

The programme supported our view: that when making a Will you should should use an organisation belonging to a regulated body and carrying Professional Indemnity Insurance.

TenMinuteWill is a member of the Society of Will Writers (SWW), the country’s leading professional body for the Will writing industry, and we carry £2.5 million of Professional Indemnity Insurance.

As with most documentaries of this type, the programme sought to suggest there is a major problem within the Will writing industry by show-casing half a dozen cases - actually concerning Probate Administration rather than Will writing - only one of which was proven to be a fraudulent case.

TenMinuteWill has delivered almost 200,000 Wills in 24 years and our insurers have never had to process a claim.

We work in an unregulated market not through choice but because successive governments have deemed it unnecessary to bring in regulation. However, the SWW and TenMinuteWill would support regulation. The SWW has been on the Scottish consultation panel since 2006 and it supports the Scottish Government in its proposed regulatory plans.

The SWW is also supporting and working with the Legal Services Board in England to regulate or at least licence Will writers and is pressing for tighter regulation of probate and client funds.

The simple truth though is that no amount of legislation will eliminate fraudulent behaviour in any industry. One of the Will writers featured in the programme was, as the Panorama report admitted, a struck-off solicitor. The legal industry is clearly not immune then to the type of issue highlighted by the programme but which it seemed to suggest lay at the door of Will writers.

TenMinuteWill would like to stress three important points which we hope will put our Customers' minds at rest on this matter:-

1. We do not do Probate (which is where all the rogue practices outlined in the programme occurred).
2. We carry £2.5 million of Professional Indemnity Insurance.
3. We would fully support any regulation of the Will writing Industry, firstly because the quality of our people and service and our unblemished record (despite having processed tens of thousands of Wills) would easily pass the most stringent of tests and secondly because it would provide you the client with a clear picture of who can be trusted.

As soon as the Will writing profession is regulated our aim is to be the first online provider to obtain the necessary ‘Government Approved’ badge.