An executor who has gone quiet is a problem with a legal answer, and the first thing to establish is whether there is a delay at all. The law and the process give an executor most of a year before anyone can properly complain. After that, the steps a beneficiary can take are real, formal and sourced below, and each one is more serious than the last.
When a delay is not a delay
Section 44 of the Administration of Estates Act 1925 says a personal representative is not bound to distribute the estate before the expiration of one year from the death (legislation.gov.uk, Administration of Estates Act 1925, checked 1 November 2026). That is the executor’s year, and it exists because the steps inside it take time.
GOV.UK’s guidance shows where the time goes. Valuing an estate can take several months, longer if it is large or has tax to pay. If Inheritance Tax is due, the IHT400 has to be filed before probate is applied for, and tax paid by the end of the sixth month. Probate usually takes up to 12 weeks from application. Then a notice in The Gazette gives creditors two months. GOV.UK says not to distribute before it runs out, because a personal representative who does can be personally liable for a debt that surfaces later (GOV.UK, Settling debts and taxes, checked 1 November 2026). Our how probate works page puts those steps in order.
So a beneficiary six months in, with no money and no news, is usually looking at the process rather than at neglect. Silence is the problem, not the time, and silence has a remedy short of court.
Step one: ask, in writing, for an account
The personal representative is legally responsible for the estate’s assets until everything is distributed, and GOV.UK says the final estate accounts should be approved and signed by them and the main beneficiaries (GOV.UK, Distributing the estate, checked 1 November 2026). A main beneficiary is therefore someone the estate must account to.
And a letter asking for an account of the assets, the debts, what has been done and what remains is the first formal step.
Keep a copy. If the matter goes further, a written request and no reply is the evidence a court will want.
Step two: find out whether probate has been granted
You do not have to take the executor’s word for it. GOV.UK’s probate records search shows whether probate has been issued for someone who died in England or Wales, and a new record appears online about 14 days after the grant (GOV.UK, Search probate records for documents and wills (England and Wales), checked 1 November 2026). A copy, with the will if there is one, costs £16.
The answer sorts the problem into two. If probate has been granted, the executor has the authority and the estate is in administration; the remedies are the account above and, ultimately, the court. If it has not been granted many months on, the executor may not have applied, and there is a specific process for that.
Step three, if no application has been made: a citation
The Non-Contentious Probate Rules provide two citations. Anyone entitled to a grant if the executor renounced can cite the executor to accept or refuse it. And any person interested in the estate can, six months after the death, cite an executor who has intermeddled to show cause why they should not take a grant (rule 47, checked 1 November 2026).
In plain terms: an executor who has started dealing with the estate but will not apply for probate can, after six months, be made to explain to the probate registry why they should not be ordered to. An executor who has done nothing can be made to accept or refuse the job so that someone else can take it. These are court processes, and they are the point at which advice is worth paying for.
Step four: asking the court to replace the executor
Where probate has been granted and the executor will not administer the estate properly, section 50 of the Administration of Justice Act 1985 lets a beneficiary apply to the High Court, which may at its discretion appoint a substitute personal representative in place of the existing one, or.
Where there are two or more, remove one or more but not all of them (legislation.gov.uk, Administration of Justice Act 1985, checked 1 November 2026).
That is litigation. It has costs, it takes time, and the court decides whether the executor’s conduct justifies it. It is the right step for an executor who has taken the grant and then abandoned the estate, or is acting against the beneficiaries’ interests, and the wrong one for a slow but functioning administration. A solicitor is not optional here.
The caveat, and why it is usually the wrong tool
A caveat stops probate being granted. GOV.UK says you can enter one if there is a dispute about who can apply for probate, whether a will exists, or whether the will is legal; it costs £4, lasts six months and can be extended.
And GOV.UK warns that it can lead to legal action and legal costs and that you should try to reach agreement first (GOV.UK, Stopping a probate application: challenge someone else's probate application, checked 1 November 2026).
It is a tool for a dispute about the grant, not for a slow executor. Where the executor already has probate, a caveat does nothing; where the complaint is delay rather than entitlement, it blocks the very thing you want to happen. The person applying for probate can give a formal warning against a caveat through the registry, which has to be answered within 14 days, and a caveat that is then contested can only be removed by order of a District Probate Registrar or a judge.
Where money has gone missing
An executor who has taken estate money for themselves is a different case from one who is slow. The court application above is available, and theft is a matter for the police. Where the concern is about what an attorney did before the death, the Office of the Public Guardian is the body to raise it with.
Our power of attorney pages cover the attorney’s duties.
What this page does not do
It does not tell you whether your executor’s delay is unreasonable; that turns on the estate, and the year and the two months are the only fixed points the law and GOV.UK give. It describes England and Wales. Scotland and Northern Ireland have different probate rules and different remedies.
Where the delay is a solicitor’s rather than a relative’s, our solicitor problems page covers the complaint route, the Legal Ombudsman and the bill.