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I barely know my own online passwords to everything.

They are haphazardly hand-written on two pieces of A4 paper, and the ink is fading at the edges.

But to the executor of an estate, these passwords are vital, especially if there is no solicitor or estate specialist helping.

As I learned recently from an article about ‘death cleaning’, everyone needs to leave a ‘digital estate’ for the poor estate executor left with the job of sorting out everything when a person dies. A digital estate is a document which lists all your logins and passwords.

Thankfully when the time came for my neighbour to act as the executor for her wife’s will, that exact document was found. (Hallelujah!)

Doris and Janey

But that was the only good news for my neighbour – let’s call her Doris – who had been in a long-term relationship with her partner Janey and married for only a short time since Australia’s same-sex marriage laws passed in 2017.

Doris was named as Janey’s executor, power of attorney and enduring guardian (and vice versa).

After experiencing some serious medical troubles in recent years, Doris, now in her 80s, was expected “to go first”. Indeed, everything about the way their legal and financial affairs were handled seemed predicated on the scenario that Doris would be the first to die.

Janey, the younger of the couple, did all the household administration. Automatic bill-paying for household accounts was set up in Janey’s name. Most online subscriptions – for both – seemed to be organised and supported by Janey with 2-factor authentication linked to her mobile phone number.

When Janey fell seriously ill in a matter of weeks and died in hospital last year, Doris was a mess. Concerningly, Doris also seemed to have some cognitive deficits that had gone previously unrecognised by friends. Doris had no family in Australia, having been born during WW2 in Europe and later migrating alone. Janey, meanwhile, had only one sibling who had no children. The couple’s friends were a tight-knit group, which due to age and death was rapidly diminishing. 

When Janey died, no one knew her mobile phone code.

She had also used ‘bio finger identification’. It was also quickly apparent in the days after Janey’s death that Doris would be unable – as the executor named in the will – to amass the assets of Janey’s estate to make the required application to the Supreme Court for a grant of probate. Thankfully both ladies had updated their wills during the COVID-19 pandemic with a solicitor’s firm. That firm was retained again to apply for probate – and also to assist Doris with updating her will and reassigning the executor as well as her power of attorney and her enduring guardian.

Unfortunately, before these important amended legal changes could be put in place for Doris, she had a fall and suffered several intracranial haemorrhages (brain bleeds). Doris spent several weeks in hospital where her cognitive deficits became more pronounced.

When specialist doctors concluded she could not return home without full-time assistance, and no further treatment was offered once the bleeds had stopped, friends rallied around Doris.

They talked Doris through the process as much as possible about what was likely if she could not return home. With Doris’s consent and the help of a hospital social worker assigned to ensure her proper care, a lovely residential aged care facility was found for her.

Meanwhile, there was still the matter of how to sort out Janey’s estate when Doris was named as the executor in Janey’s will. That’s where I came in.

In the wider aspect of Doris’s care, I became part of the small group of friends looking after Doris’s welfare. Legally, we were jointly appointed her power of attorney, which allowed us to arrange her aged care accommodation, pay her bills there, and also pay bills at the house where she no longer lived, pending its possible sale. Janey’s sibling had a role too in taking up the job as Doris’s guardian. In better health, Doris had named Janey’s sibling as her legal guardian if the need arose, and the time had indeed come.

Doris needed more help when it came to the executor role of Janey’s estate.

She was the sole beneficiary of Janey’s half of their assets – a fairly typical and normally straightforward transfer for married couples when one predeceases the other – but she needed more than usual assistance to make the transfer work.

And so it was that I acted on Doris’s behalf, as executor, to get the ball rolling on Janey’s estate by sending a list of all Janey’s assets that could be found, in the first instance, to the estate’s solicitor for his preparation of an application to the state’s supreme court for a grant of probate, ahead of an expected distribution to beneficiaries – in this case to Doris.

I’d known Doris and Janey for many years as their neighbour – we’d had Friday sunset sparkling shiraz and cheese from time to time – and I had been helping Doris draw up a list of Janey’s assets before Doris had her fall. After her fall my role took on new significance. I consulted her on everything and there were times when it was clear she was giving free consent. At others it seemed she was not in a position to do so. These were difficult times. I wondered sometimes what would happen in circumstances where people, family or otherwise, could not be trusted.

In my case, I was a friend but still an outsider and not family, because there was none. I was very aware of this unusual situation. I took comfort, as did everyone in Doris’s friends’ group, that as much as we all believed each other to have utmost integrity, we also had the practical benefit of everyone being a check and balance for the sake of accountability.

With the role of executor of Janey’s estate really falling to me, the neighbour, I visited Doris at her new aged accommodation whenever I could. I asked her the necessary questions, which she answered as best as she could.

Do you have joint bank accounts?

Do you have any shares?

What superannuation do you have?

Do you have any other investments?

Do you have any debts?

As more weeks passed, it became clear there was no one else in Doris’s small group of friends who had the time to drill into this detail. I accepted I was in the best position to do it, and reported to the group my new discoveries as they were made.

But it was problematic. Even with Janey’s logins and passwords document which I’d found, certain household bills could not be paid. Some others remained in a category of unknowns. Not even known unknowns.

The lack of 2-factor authentication to Janey’s mobile phone was a huge problem. I was told by a Telstra employee that Janey’s phone password could not be changed by SMS message sent to her phone, or by another method such as email.

It was a similar problem for Janey’s Bigpond email address, with the situation remaining that we could not access Janey’s emails, which largely controlled the bills. Normally this would be a good thing, but not in death when another life revolves around the deceased. It was only months later when I returned to the same Telstra shop, that I was able to locate the Telstra Compassionate Care Team on 1800 775 932.

At least it had been accepted legally that Doris was capable of appointing her new powers of attorney. I and two other friends, who also did not want her life to be controlled by the Public Trustee, tasked ourselves to organise her life – with her continued permission – as she settled reluctantly but resignedly into aged care living, accepting her poor memory and other problems meant she could no longer live alone at home.

It was a sad fact that Doris’s life had been suddenly, totally upended and she was without her normal social supports or interests.

At her new home, the cognitive wing of a well-appointed aged care facility, Doris’s personal effects in her room were regularly ‘re-homed’. Residents from adjoining rooms would often visit when she was out and repatriate items to their rooms.

It quickly became clear, to the Doris friend group, that it was better for Doris to be left without her mobile phone. A laptop computer was out of the question as valuable effects were regularly ‘moved’ and sometimes lost forever within the facility.

We never did see a potted sunflower again, brought as a gift for Doris in her first week.

And so it is, nine months after Janey died, and six months after Doris had her fall and went to hospital never to return home, that her three powers of attorney are also forever changed.

They are extremely stressed. As one of them, I have succeeded in amassing Janey’s assets on Doris’s behalf (at the direction of the estate’s solicitor). I continue to organise all bill payments and keep track of financials and cancel subscriptions, as well as organising house maintenance until Doris’s property is sold.

Another power of attorney has performed the onerous task of liaising with Centrelink over pensions, attended lengthy meetings to understand terminology and form filling, sorted out overlapping superannuation and Centrelink issues, and taken over care for Doris’s loved pet, all the while visiting and calling Doris regularly.

The third is at the house almost daily, sorting through a large house full of the items – books, files, clothes, historical items, computers, musical instruments, artwork and seemingly endless notes from Janey. All form part of the full lives of two ladies suddenly apart after decades together.

Janey’s sibling continues in the role of enduring guardian for Doris and liaises with the aged care facility and her medical practitioners as issues arise. Recently, another enduring guardian was appointed with Doris’s agreement to assist. He is a generation younger, and a younger alternative is always a good idea as we age, to cope with the unexpected.

We all limp on. Doris, we hope, is at least as comfortable as possible. Even if her slippers went missing again this week.

Some important tips based on my experience

1. Make a will and keep it updated

Every 5 years or so is a good rule of thumb, particularly as you and your children age.

2. Appoint ‘cascading’ executors (for wills), powers of attorney (for financial issues of those living near end of life) and enduring guardians (for medical issues for those living near end of life).

In other words, alternatives who can take up these roles if the main people named are incapacitated or not available or indeed deceased. With more than one executor named, if Person A cannot or will not act as executor when the time comes, then Person B can. But if Person B cannot or will not act as executor then Person C can, etc. This can start with, say, a spouse, who may predecease the husband/wife and then it falls to a child and then another child or a trusted friend who is hopefully in a younger generation. The same cascading appointment of powers of attorney could also apply, and again for an enduring guardian, if that person is not also the executor.

3. Get the agreement of the executor before naming them in a will.

It is an onerous duty in some circumstances, particularly if there is friction, disagreement or outright hostility between beneficiaries. Executors are also entitled to a fee for work done – up to three per cent and possibly more in some states, depending on the time and effort and calculated on the value of estate assets. Beneficiaries are generally not entitled to a commission if they are estate executors. Nor is a power of attorney for the living entitled to a fee, due to the financial conflict of interest.

4. Beware Trustee and Guardianship institutions.

If there is a possibility that this type of institution ends up as executor look closely at its website. The Public Trustee, as it was formerly known in NSW, has a job to do for people who do not have executors or if executors decline to take up the role or if a person dies without a will. But the trustee also charges very high fees and can be interventionist. Best to have an executor with a family connection, if at all possible.

4. Ensure the land title of any property owned by the person with a will lists the correct owner, or owners.

If a property is left as an asset to beneficiaries, say by two parents and one of them has died, the title must have only the name of the surviving spouse if it is to be sold. Often years can pass without the deceased spouse’s name being removed (fees are involved) – if the surviving spouse is even aware this needs to occur. It can create delays if changes to the correct name are needed after a person has died and probate is being sorted out.

5. Avoid surprises, some can be nasty.

If you are told you are named as executor or any role in a will, ask to read it.

My aunt, aged 91 was surprised to find she had been appointed executor of the will of her sister-in-law, aged 94 at her death. Presumably the will was made years earlier and not updated. There was no way my aunt could carry out any of the duties of executor and it eventually fell to the appointed solicitor after another named executor was also found to be not capable of carrying out the role.

Another relative was appointed executor of an elderly woman’s estate – without his knowledge. Out of a sense of moral duty to this friend of the family he took on the role, which – on its face – seemed fairly straightforward.

However, due to an imprecisely worded section in the will, he found (to his diminishing mental health) that the task of executor was far more complicated that it first appeared. He found, after nearly 18 months of nearly full-time attention to the role of executor, that he was responsible for payment of all council and water rates and insurances for a property purchased from the proceeds of the main asset of the estate – the family home – for one of the beneficiaries. This was because the executor was now the ‘trustee’ of the enduring estate, which now owned the new property.

To complicate matters, the beneficiary was indigent and would not, without a distribution from the remaining assets of the estate, have been able to reimburse the executor for the rates and insurances and general maintenance that goes with a property. This in turn had financial and taxation implications for the executor – far beyond the intent of the ‘gift’ to the beneficiary. This included land tax implications for the trustee and difficulties insuring the property for the beneficiary who did not ‘own’ the house but lived in it rent-free for as long as he wished (or for the rest of his life).

Thus, when that executor tried to resign from the role after fulfilling all the onerous initial duties in selling and buying assets, setting up bank accounts to organise the remaining estate and having many, many lengthy conversations explaining his actions to all beneficiaries, he learned he could not do so without permission from the Supreme Court.

He could not merely walk away because he was named as the executor in the will. And until the provisions of the will were extinguished, which would not occur until the property bought for the one beneficiary was sold and the proceeds split between that person and the other beneficiaries, he was supposed to stay in that role. It may last decades.

So, in order for the estate to be managed by another executor, all the beneficiaries must agree on the next appointment. However, the first choice of executor was not agreed to by all beneficiaries. Another choice is under consideration. Meanwhile, that executor, is in declining mental health at the prospect of managing the demands of the beneficiary ‘gifted’ the property for the foreseeable future, which has taken up a huge chunk of his time for 18 months or so. However, if the beneficiaries do not agree on a replacement within the family, most of the remaining assets may be lost if the Public Trustee, which he fears will charge seemingly exorbitant rates to manage estates, is appointed.

There is no blanket fee nationally for the public administration of estates, as each public trustee operates independently in each state or territory. Visit these links for information on fees that apply by public trustees or equivalents in Queensland, Victoria, Tasmania, The Australian Capital Territory, South Australia, The Northern Territory and Western Australia.

Let’s say an estate is worth $2 million in cash and property assets and a trust has been set up under the terms of the will to administer certain conditions, as in this case described above.

Under the fee structure set out by the NSW Public Trustee and Guardian to administer an ongoing trust for an estate worth $2 million the one-off establishment fee charged, for instance, is around $11,000. 

On top, there is an annual fee of 0.77% of the value of estate assets held, which on $2 million would be around $15,000 (less over time if money is distributed from the trust). Then there are account-keeping fees, as well as investment fees (if needed) for any money in the trust. 

Legal work is charged at hourly rates similar to commercial fees charged by solicitors. 

On top, if there is any property in the trust to be sold in future, conveyancing and other legal fees apply, as well as fees for annual tax returns for the estate and, potentially, other costs.

It’s important stuff to ponder, so follow those tips.

6. Leave your mobile phone passcode somewhere in your home for it to be found.

The same for the password to your computer – laptop, iPad, PC or iMac or other entertainment devices.

Passwords are the keys to lives these days – and also to sorting out estates after deaths.