When someone dies without a will, their family meets a system built on the assumption that somebody was named to take charge. Nobody was. The law fills the gap with a fixed order of priority, and it does not always match who was closest to the person.
What letters of administration actually are
Letters of administration are the legal authority to deal with someone’s money, property and possessions after they die, granted when there is no will. They do the same job as a grant of probate, but go to a relative chosen by law rather than an executor chosen by the person who died.
Banks, insurers and the Land Registry will generally not release or transfer anything without seeing that authority, which is why the application usually comes before anything else can be settled. The holder is called the administrator (GOV.UK, Applying for probate: if there is not a will, checked 10 September 2026).
Who can apply, and in what order
The order of priority is set by law, not by who volunteers. It goes first to the husband, wife or civil partner — including where the couple were separated. If there is no surviving spouse, the right passes to children aged 18 or over, then to other close relatives (GOV.UK, Applying for probate: if there is not a will, checked 10 September 2026).
Being separated does not remove a spouse’s right to apply. Divorce or dissolution does, and so does a decree of judicial separation still in force, under which the Matrimonial Causes Act says the property passes as if the spouse had died first (Matrimonial Causes Act 1973, section 18, checked 1 November 2026).
The two exclusions that catch families out
Two groups find, too late, that they have no right to apply, having treated themselves as next of kin. GOV.UK says you cannot apply as a partner who was not a husband, wife or civil partner when the person died, and step-children are not counted among the children who can apply (GOV.UK, Applying for probate: if there is not a will, checked 1 November 2026).
An unmarried partner cannot apply. If you were not the husband, wife or civil partner of the person when they died, the right is not yours, whether you lived together for two years or forty. It passes instead to their children, or to whichever relative comes next in the order.
A step-child cannot apply as a child. The rule covers children aged 18 or over, including those legally adopted. A step-child who was never formally adopted is not included, even where they were, in every ordinary sense, the person’s family.
If the person entitled does not want to do it
Entitlement is not an obligation. Being first in line does not mean you must take on months of paperwork, and there are two formal ways out rather than one (GOV.UK, Applying for probate: if there is not a will, checked 10 September 2026). Which you choose matters, because one keeps your position open and the other closes it permanently.
Form PA12 appoints somebody else to act on your behalf while your entitlement stays with you. It is the route to take when you want the work done by another person — a sibling with more time, or a solicitor — without giving up your position.
Form PA16 gives up the right permanently, and it then passes to the next person in the order of priority. Use this when you do not want the role at all.
PA16 is not reversible. Once the right has moved on, it cannot be taken back if circumstances change later.
It takes longer than probate, and it is worth knowing that upfront
Letters of administration are slower to issue than a grant of probate, and the difference is not small. In January to March 2026 the mean was 11 weeks from application to issue, against 5 weeks for a grant of probate. Where there is a will but no executor who can act, the figure was 20 weeks.
Those are the published Ministry of Justice averages, not estimates (Family Court Statistics Quarterly, Ministry of Justice, checked 10 September 2026). GOV.UK’s general guidance still says you will usually get the document within 12 weeks. That sits above the 5-week probate average but well short of the 20-week wait for letters of administration with a will annexed, so the same guidance figure means very different things depending on which document you need.
Our guide to how long probate takes breaks all three routes down, including what pushes a case from two weeks to fourteen.
Before you apply
You need an estimate of what the estate is worth before you can apply, because the figure is part of the application and determines whether inheritance tax has to be reported first. That means totting up property, savings, investments and possessions, and setting debts and funeral costs against them.
It is worth being careful rather than quick here. Estate figures that do not match what HMRC holds can get an application stopped and sent back. A stopped application took 14 weeks on average in January to March 2026, against 2 weeks for one that was not stopped (Family Court Statistics Quarterly, Ministry of Justice, checked 10 September 2026).
Who inherits is a separate question
Two things get muddled, and separating them saves arguments later. Being the administrator means you are the person who deals with the estate — collecting it, paying debts, distributing what remains. Who inherits is set by the rules of intestacy instead, and the two are not always the same person (GOV.UK, Applying for probate: if there is not a will, checked 10 September 2026).
Where there is no will, the rules of intestacy decide who inherits and in what shares. Those rules are detailed, and they depend on who survives the person and what the estate is worth. GOV.UK has a checker that works it out from your circumstances: check who can inherit when there is no will, Intestacy. Our dying without a will page sets out the order and the £322,000 a spouse takes first.
Each figure and rule on this page carries the date we last checked it against its source. The badge at the top is the date the page itself was last revised.