Written question asked by Alex Sobel (Labour) on Thursday, 21 January 2021, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 26 January 2021 (named day). It was answered by Alex Chalk (Conservative) on Tuesday, 26 January 2021 on behalf of the Ministry of Justice.

Probate: Standards

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent assessment his Department has made of the level of administrative delays in probate cases.

Answer

The most recently published information regarding waiting times for a grant of probate covers July 2020 to September 2020 and is published on gov.uk via Family Court Statistics Quarterly (Table 26):

Average time to grant issue for probate grants, England and Wales ^{1,2, 3}
	Application submission to grant issue		Document receipt to grant issue³
	Mean weeks	Median weeks	Mean weeks	Median weeks
July 2020 to September 2020	6.7	4.9	6	4.4

Source HMCTS Core Case Data

1) HMCTS Core Case Data (CCD) came into effect at the end of March 2019, following a transition between data systems recording information regarding The Probate Service.

2) The average timeliness figures are produced by calculating the time from application/document receipt (which may be from an earlier period) to the grant issued made in that period.

3) Document receipt occurs after payment has been made and all accompanying paperwork has been received by HMCTS.

In 2020 the level of applications being made increased and the service faced unprecedented challenges due to the impact of Covid-19.

Despite this, and as a result of HMCTS increasing resources to meet demand, the average length of time taken for a Grant of Probate to be issued improved quarter on quarter throughout the year.

Secondary information

Type: Written question
Reference: 141601
Session: 2019-21
Subjects: Probate Standards
Contains statistics: Yes
Link: View this Written question on www.parliament.uk

Probate: Standards

Secondary information

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