Checklist Planning Ahead
Make sure key legal documentation is up to date and in order:
- Last Will and Testament (appoint executors, ideally with their knowledge & consent)
- Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) for Health & Welfare and for Property & Financial Affairs
- Advance Decision to Refuse Treatment (ADRT or Living Will)
Other important documentation:
- Letter of Wishes/Letter of Funeral Wishes
- Organ Donor Registration or opt in/out choice
- Legacy Will/Ethical Will
Gather together household and administrative information, including passwords where required:
- National Insurance/Pension record
- National Health number
- Unique Taxpayer Reference
- Passport number
- Property deeds
- Employer information
- Lawyer
- Accountant
- Financial adviser
- Bank accounts
- Credit card providers
- Details of outstanding loans
- Insurers (household, mortgage, life, health, car, pet, etc)
- Mortgage provider
- Driving License number
- Car details/loans
- Payment systems (eg PayPal)
- Bitcoin
- Home security system/household safe
- Utility providers (electricity, gas, water)
- Landlord
- Mobile phone
- Landline telephone
- Internet
- Newspapers & magazines
- Social media (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc)
- TV and media subscriptions (Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc)
- Books and audiobook subscriptions
- Online gaming subscriptions
- Online photo/data storage (ICloud, etc)
- Online music/playlists (Spotify, etc)
- Antivirus
- Gym or health club membership
- Sports, social and other club memberships
- Loyalty cards
Business Owners consider the impact your death will have on your business
Digital memorials and digital legacy:
Ensure that you decide what happens to your digital legacy.
- Make sure photos are stored somewhere that those you wish to do so have access
- Decide what happens to your online social media presence (appoint a Legacy Contact)
- Decide how you wish to be remembered and curate your digital legacy, if desired
Share information with those closest to you and ensure they agree with your plans. This can help avoid disputes and disagreements after you have gone
Important discussions to have with those closest to you:
- End of life decisions around treatment and care
- Whether you wish to be buried or cremated (or other), and where
- If you are cremated, what should happen to your ashes?
- Funeral wishes (memorial, celebration of life, religious/non-religious, no ceremony)
- Wishes around key possessions, both big and small
- Preferences for charitable donations
Make sure all this information is written down and kept somewhere secure, in print form and/or in a digital locker
Ensure the relevant people know where to find everything and how to access it
Decide who will care for your pets and any other animals
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