Why probate takes as long as it does, and the two things that make it longer

The grant itself is the quick part. Once the Probate Registry has the application it is currently taking around sixteen weeks, and that number has been better and worse in the last two years. The long part sits either side of it.

Before the application there is the valuation. Every account, every policy, every holding and the house all have to be valued at the date of death, not at today's price. Banks answer in their own time. A pension provider can take six weeks to confirm a figure that turns out to be nil.

After the grant there is the collecting in, the tax, the sale of any property and the distribution. If there is a house to sell, the estate moves at the speed of the housing market and nothing else.

Two things make it longer than it needs to be. The first is a missing valuation nobody chased. The second is a house put on the market before the grant arrives, because a buyer will not wait and the chain collapses.

There is nothing you can do this week that changes the sixteen weeks. There is quite a lot you can do that stops it becoming twenty six.