A clean, fixed-fee will for the substantial estate you've spent two decades building. Delivered within 24 hours. £69 single. £99 mirror for couples. Returned within 24 hours.
The pattern with medical professionals is consistent: by the time a doctor sits down to write their first will, they're usually a consultant in their forties, with two children, a substantial mortgage, an NHS pension that's already past £500k in value, and possibly some private practice income. The will should have been written 15 years earlier when they qualified — but the busy years of training and early consultant life make procrastination structural.
The good news: writing the will now is straightforward. The bad news: every year you've waited has been a year your family has been exposed to the Intestacy Rules — which for high-earning, married-with-children doctors typically results in messy splits between spouse and children that don't reflect what anyone in the household would have wanted, and create avoidable inheritance tax problems on the second death.
Most doctors want everything to their spouse, then to children equally. Sounds simple. Under intestacy, it isn't — your spouse gets a fixed statutory legacy plus half of the residue, and your children get the other half. For estates over the inheritance tax threshold, this often results in tax payable that wouldn't be due if the will had been drafted properly using the spouse exemption. A well-drafted will routes everything to the spouse first, deferring IHT until the second death.
Bequests to adult children can be drafted as outright gifts (simplest) or as discretionary trusts (more protective). For most doctor estates, outright gifts are appropriate — but you can specify ages of inheritance (often 21 or 25 rather than the default 18) and name reserve beneficiaries if a child predeceases you.
Your NHS Pension Scheme death benefits are paid at discretion under your nominee form (DB2 or PN1) — separately from your will. The 2015 scheme typically pays a lump sum of two times final pensionable pay plus an ongoing dependant's pension. Update your nominee form alongside writing your will, especially if you've remarried, divorced, or had additional children.
If you hold private practice income through a limited company, your shares form part of your estate and are dealt with by the will. If you have partnership interests in a GP practice or chambers, the partnership agreement usually has first call — bring those documents to the questionnaire so we can draft around them.
Same point as for any other parent — only a will can name guardians legally. Many doctors are surprised to find this is the most important clause in the will rather than the financial provisions.
ClearLegacy's wills are designed for the substantial majority of doctor estates: home, NHS pension under nomination, savings, life insurance, possibly some private practice income. The complexity threshold where a will alone stops being adequate:
If your situation looks like it falls into any of those, we'll flag it during review and recommend a STEP-qualified solicitor for the more complex piece — not push you through a product that doesn't fit.
We don't currently offer Lasting Power of Attorney, probate administration, trust formation, or active IHT planning. For LPAs, the Office of the Public Guardian's online service is the cheapest official route. For complex estate planning, we're happy to point you toward STEP-qualified specialists.
You'd think nothing of writing a £200 cheque to a colleague for a half-hour consultation. £69 to formalise everything you've spent twenty years building is a sensible trade.