What to Do When Someone Dies in the UK: A Step-by-Step Guide

Picture the moment after a phone call. Someone you love has died, perhaps after a long illness, perhaps without any warning at all. You are standing in a hallway with your coat half on, and somewhere underneath the shock a quieter voice is asking: what am I actually supposed to do now?

Almost nobody knows. Most people only deal with a death as the person in charge a handful of times in their life, and each time it arrives without a manual. Around 170,000 people die around the world every day, which you can see happening on the live counter, and in the UK that is about 1,800 deaths a day, as we explained in how many people die in the UK every day. Behind every one of those is someone standing in a hallway.

This guide is the manual. It sets out what needs doing, roughly in order, with the deadlines that matter and the ones that do not. Take it a step at a time. Very little has to happen today.

The first few hours

What happens first depends on where and how the person died.

Situation	What to do
Expected death at home (for example with palliative care)	Call the GP surgery or the community or district nurse team. This is not usually a 999 call
Expected death in a hospital, hospice or care home	Staff will handle the first steps and explain what happens next
Sudden or unexpected death at home or elsewhere	Call 999. Police and paramedics will attend
Death abroad	Contact the local police and the British embassy or consulate, and the travel insurer if there is one

When a death is expected, there is no need to rush. Many families sit with the person for a while, call relatives, or simply take a breath. A doctor or nurse will come to verify the death, and once that is done you can contact a funeral director to take the person into their care, whenever you feel ready.

If the death was sudden, unexplained, violent, or happened after surgery or an accident, it will usually be reported to the coroner (the procurator fiscal in Scotland). This can feel frightening, but it is routine. The coroner's job is to establish the cause of death, and in many cases this is done quickly without an inquest.

Getting the medical certificate

Before a death can be registered, a doctor needs to issue a Medical Certificate of Cause of Death, often called the MCCD. In England and Wales, a medical examiner also independently reviews the cause of death for deaths that are not referred to the coroner, and may speak to the family about it.

Who is involved	Their role
The attending doctor	Completes the medical certificate stating the cause of death
Medical examiner (England and Wales)	Independently checks the cause of death and can answer questions from the family
Coroner	Investigates if the cause is unknown, sudden or unnatural
Registrar	Records the death officially once the paperwork is in place

In most cases the certificate is sent electronically from the hospital or GP to the register office, and the register office or the hospital bereavement team will tell you when you can book an appointment.

Registering the death

Registering a death is a legal requirement, and there are time limits.

Where the death happened	Deadline to register
England and Wales	Within 5 days
Scotland	Within 8 days
Northern Ireland	Within 5 days

The deadline can be extended if the coroner is involved, so do not worry if a coroner's investigation delays things. The register office will guide you.

Registration is usually done by a relative, but it can also be done by someone who was present at the death, an administrator from the hospital or care home, or the person arranging the funeral. You normally register in the area where the person died.

What to bring

Bring if you can	Why
The medical certificate (if not sent electronically)	Needed to register
Their full name, and any previous names	For the official record
Date and place of birth	For the official record
Their last address	For the official record
Their occupation	For the official record
Details of a surviving spouse or civil partner	For the official record and for benefits
NHS number, birth and marriage certificates, passport, driving licence	Helpful, not always essential

What you will leave with

The registrar will give you:

• A certificate for burial or cremation (often called the green form in England and Wales), which you give to the funeral director.
• Copies of the death certificate. It is worth buying several certified copies at this point, because banks, insurers and pension providers often want an original rather than a photocopy, and copies can cost more if you order them later.
• In most of Great Britain, a reference number for Tell Us Once.

Tell Us Once: the service that saves the most time

Tell Us Once is a free government service that lets you report a death to most central and local government departments in one go, instead of contacting each one separately. The registrar will offer it when you register, and you can then complete it online or by phone, usually within 28 days.

Tell Us Once can notify	What this means for you
HM Revenue and Customs	Tax affairs are flagged
Department for Work and Pensions	State Pension and benefits are stopped or reviewed
HM Passport Office	Passport is cancelled
DVLA	Driving licence and vehicle records are updated
The local council	Council Tax, Blue Badge, library and other services
Some public sector pension schemes	Pension records are updated

Tell Us Once does not cover private companies: banks, energy suppliers, mobile phone networks, private pensions, insurance and subscriptions all need to be contacted separately. We come to those below.

Arranging the funeral

There is no legal deadline for a funeral in the UK, and in practice many take place two to three weeks after the death, sometimes longer. Some faiths hold funerals much sooner, and funeral directors and local register offices are used to helping with this.

The first question is whether the person left any wishes. Check for:

• a will, which may mention funeral wishes
• a prepaid funeral plan
• a note or planner left with family
• any conversations they had with relatives

Decision	Common options
Burial or cremation	Burial, cremation with a service, or direct cremation with no service
Type of service	Religious, civil celebrant, humanist, or none
Where	Place of worship, crematorium chapel, graveside, or another venue
Who leads it	Minister, celebrant, family member or friend
Afterwards	Gathering, wake, or nothing formal

If the person died with little money and you are on certain benefits, you may be able to apply for a Funeral Expenses Payment from the government. The funeral director can also often be paid from the person's bank account before probate, if the bank agrees, because many banks will release funds directly to pay a funeral invoice.

The first two weeks: a checklist

Once the death is registered and the funeral is in hand, the practical admin begins. Here is a realistic order.

Task	Who to contact	Notes
Find the will	Home, solicitor, bank, will storage service	The will may name executors and include funeral wishes
Secure the home	Lock up, check heating and post	Especially if the person lived alone
Care for dependants and pets	Family, friends	Often the most urgent practical job
Tell close family and friends	Phone, then wider networks	Ask one person to help spread the news
Tell their employer	HR department	May involve final pay and death-in-service benefits
Contact banks and building societies	Each bank, or the Death Notification Service	Accounts are usually frozen
Contact pension providers	Each provider	Some pay lump sums or pensions to dependants
Contact insurers	Life, home, car, health	Life cover can help with immediate costs
Contact the landlord or mortgage lender	Directly	Ask about notice periods and payment holidays
Contact utilities, phone and broadband	Each supplier	Ask for final readings and closure
Cancel subscriptions	Streaming, gyms, memberships	These often keep charging for months
Redirect post	Royal Mail	Helps catch accounts nobody knew about
Reduce unwanted mail	The Bereavement Register	Cuts down distressing marketing post

The Death Notification Service is worth knowing about. It lets you tell several banks and building societies about a death in one go, rather than calling each one separately.

The estate: probate and letters of administration

The estate is everything the person owned, minus what they owed. Someone has to collect it in, pay the debts, and pass on what is left. That person is the executor (if there is a will) or the administrator (if there is not).

	If there is a will	If there is no will
Who deals with it	Executors named in the will	The next of kin, in a fixed legal order
Document needed	Grant of probate	Letters of administration
Where to apply	GOV.UK (England and Wales)	GOV.UK (England and Wales)
In Scotland	Confirmation, through the sheriff court	Confirmation, through the sheriff court

Probate is not always needed. Small estates, and assets that were jointly owned and pass automatically to the survivor, may not require it. Each bank or organisation has its own limit for releasing money without a grant. If there is no will, our guide to what happens if you die without a will in the UK explains who inherits.

Inheritance Tax may also be due. The standard tax-free threshold, called the nil-rate band, is £325,000, and an additional residence nil-rate band of up to £175,000 can apply when a home is passed to children or grandchildren. Allowances can also be transferred between spouses and civil partners. Most estates in the UK pay no Inheritance Tax, but the forms often still need to be completed. HMRC's guidance on GOV.UK sets out exactly which forms apply.

Money help for the bereaved

Support	Who may be eligible
Bereavement Support Payment	A spouse or civil partner who was under State Pension age when their partner died, if the partner had paid National Insurance
Funeral Expenses Payment	People on certain benefits who are responsible for paying for a funeral
Guardian's Allowance	People raising a child whose parents have died
State Pension inheritance	A surviving spouse may inherit part of their partner's State Pension, depending on dates and circumstances

Claims often have time limits, so it is worth checking GOV.UK early, even if you do not feel ready to deal with money yet.

The digital side

Phones, email, photos and social media accounts all need handling too, and most families find this the most confusing part because the information lives behind passwords. Our separate guide on what happens to your social media when you die walks through memorialising Facebook and Instagram, Google's Inactive Account Manager and Apple's Legacy Contact.

Looking after yourself

None of this has to be done perfectly, and almost none of it has to be done in the first week. A realistic timeline helps:

When	What usually happens
First day	Death is verified, family is told, funeral director is contacted
Within 5 days (8 in Scotland)	The death is registered
First 2 to 3 weeks	Funeral takes place, Tell Us Once is completed
First 1 to 3 months	Banks, pensions and suppliers are notified, probate application starts
6 to 12 months	The estate is usually settled, though it can take longer

Grief does not follow that timeline. Organisations such as Cruse Bereavement Support offer free help in the UK, and your GP can help too. If the person was cared for at the end of their life, our guide to what happens in the last days of life may help make sense of what you saw.

Making it easier for the people after you

Almost every hard part of this guide comes down to one problem: information that lived only in the head of the person who died. Which banks? Which pensions? Where is the will? What did they want for their funeral?

If reading this has made you think about your own family having to do all of it, two things help most. The first is a will, and our Will Calculator is a gentle place to start thinking about one. The second is writing down where everything is, which is exactly what our When I'm Gone planner is designed for: a fillable PDF that records accounts, documents, wishes and the people to notify, without ever storing a password.

Every day the live death counter moves on by around 170,000 people, and every one of them leaves someone working through a list like this one. Having it written down, calmly and in advance, is one of the kindest things anyone can leave behind.

Sources: GOV.UK guidance on what to do after someone dies, registering a death, Tell Us Once, probate, Inheritance Tax and bereavement benefits; mygov.scot and nidirect.gov.uk for Scotland and Northern Ireland. Rules, fees and allowances change, so always check the official guidance for your part of the UK. This article is general information only and is not legal, financial or medical advice.