Kate Payne speaks with Pensions Age on difficult decisions trustees face in death benefit pensions cases.

A case that I am familiar with involved a man in his mid-thirties passing away after having filled his EoW, nominating the two children as potential beneficiaries. However, the grandfather then produced paternity proof in relation to a further child from a secret relationship his son had. Given the trustees were required to consider all potential beneficiaries, the third child became a beneficiary under the trust set up for his children.

Another involved an elderly lady who married a much younger Portuguese man. She died and, in considering who to pay the lump sum to, the trustees were presented with a newspaper report suggesting he had murdered his last wife. This was interesting and the trustees may have felt uncomfortable about the risk that someone should profit from crime, however there was no proof that the newspaper report was accurate so was not strictly a relevant factor.

Partner Kate Payne
Read Kate’s article in Pensions Age