Probate, confirmation, IHT and estate administration providers compared

Fixed-fee grant only

A firm prepares and submits the application, and you do everything else: the banks, the sale, the distribution. Typically £400 to £1,500 plus VAT on top of the court fee.

Good for: you are happy to do the legwork but want the application checked by someone who does it daily, or the will has a wrinkle. Ask exactly where the service stops, because 'grant only' means the firm's job ends when the grant lands in your hand.

Probate solicitor, hourly rate

Full administration billed for time actually spent, usually £150 to £350 an hour plus VAT and 15 to 40 hours of work. On a £300,000 estate that is roughly £3,000 to £10,000, and £4,000 to £14,000 on £700,000.

Good for: a complicated estate where nobody can predict the work in advance, a contested will, or an executor who cannot take it on. Ask for an estimate in writing, ask who does the work and at what rate, and ask to be told when the estimate is about to be exceeded.

Probate solicitor, percentage of the estate

Charged as 1 to 5 per cent of what the estate is worth, sometimes with an hourly element on top. On a £300,000 estate that is £3,000 to £15,000, and on £700,000 it is £7,000 to £35,000.

The problem is simple: the size of the estate is not a measure of the work. A £700,000 estate consisting of one house and one bank account is less work than a £200,000 estate spread across eleven providers. If a firm quotes a percentage, ask them to quote a fixed fee for the same job and compare.

Bank and will-writer probate services

Some banks and will-writing companies offer probate and estate administration, occasionally as the professional executor named in a will they wrote. Convenient, and often the most expensive route, with percentage charging common.

If a bank or firm is named as executor in the will, you are not obliged to accept its charging. It can be asked to renounce in favour of the family, and many will, though they are not required to. Ask for the fee scale in writing before deciding.

Estate administration firms

Non-solicitor firms that handle the whole administration, often at a fixed price. They can be good value on a mid-sized estate with several providers to chase, because the work is process rather than law.

Check who is regulated and for what. Probate work can be done by solicitors regulated by the SRA, chartered legal executives regulated by CILEx Regulation, and licensed probate practitioners regulated by CLC or ICAEW. An unregulated firm may still be perfectly good, but you have less recourse if it is not. Ask whether client money is held in a protected account.

Inheritance tax and valuation specialists

A chartered tax adviser or an accountant is the right call on the tax itself: business or agricultural relief, gifts in the seven years before death, trusts, or non-UK assets. Fees are usually hourly or fixed per piece of work, and a few hundred pounds of advice can save a great deal of tax.

A RICS surveyor for property and a specialist valuer for art, antiques, jewellery or a business share are worth paying for where HMRC might challenge a figure. An estate agent's marketing appraisal is not a formal valuation.

Scotland: confirmation

Scotland is a separate system. Confirmation is applied for through the Sheriff Court, and there is no fee at or below £50,000, £351 up to £250,000 and £705 above that, rising in April 2027. Small estates at or below £36,000 can use the court's own small estates service, where staff help complete the forms.

For anything larger, use a Scottish solicitor rather than an English probate firm. Prior rights, legal rights and the moveable and heritable distinction have no English equivalent.

How to compare quotes properly

Put every quote on the same footing before you choose.

• Ask for the total including VAT and disbursements, not the headline rate
• Ask exactly what is included, and specifically whether the property sale, the tax return and the estate accounts are in or out
• Ask what happens if the estate turns out to be more complicated than expected
• Ask who will actually do the work and how you will be updated
• Check the regulator, and check that client money is protected
• Get at least two quotes. The spread on the same estate is routinely thousands of pounds