Luca Angarano, Head of the Litigation Department at Walker Foster and a contentious probate specialist, has successfully settled this claim through mediation, allowing our client to avoid court proceedings and enable the estate to finally be administered.

The challenges

Our client was a joint executor of her mother’s estate, and one of six beneficiaries. Our client and her co-executor were unable to act in unison with regards to the estate’s administration, and therefore our client sought to remove herself and her brother as executors, and to have the court appoint a third-party professional Executor.

As neither executor had intermeddled in the estate, our client was able to pursue such a claim, pursuant to Section 50 of the Administration of Justice Act 1985. However, our client’s brother was adamant that he should be able to undertake his role as executor, as he had a strong sense of duty to undertake his mother’s wishes and therefore wanted to be able to administer her estate. 

How Walker Foster helped

The client chose Walker Foster because her mother had previously instructed us to prepare her will. Our client therefore trusted us from the outset, as we had been her mother’s solicitors.

Walker Foster’s approach was to set out our client’s claim robustly, but to advise our client to settle if there was an agreement to be had that she was comfortable with. This was the best approach to take, because the court expects the use of court time to be an absolute last resort. The court therefore very much encourages the parties to settle without using the court system.

In this case, proceedings did have to be issued, because the claim could not be settled at the pre-litigation stage. The defendant had not been willing to step down as executor throughout correspondence, and there was significant risk that our client would have to endure undue stress and costs in pursuing the matter all the way to trial.

The outcome

The case was successfully mediated in person in Skipton. The mediation meeting allowed our client and her brother to find a way to work together. To save on cost, they agreed to remain as executors rather than appoint a professional executor, but, to ensure the estate was administered, they agreed to appoint the private client department of another firm of solicitors to administer the estate.

Had our client lost at trial, her brother would have remained as executor and our client would have had to bear her own costs and the cost of the defendant,  which together would have likely exceeded £90,000.