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Legal Rights and Charity Gifts in a Scottish Will
Legal Rights and Charity Gifts in a Scottish Will

Where an individual has made a Scottish Will, charities should be aware of the effects of a claim of legal rights on any gifts left to them

Sindy Allen avatar
Written by Sindy Allen
Updated over 2 years ago

This guidance only applies if you are making a Will in Scotland.

If you decide to make a gift to charity (either a cash gift or a percentage of your estate), the gift should not be affected by legal rights unless the estate is too small to meet the legal rights claim and the gifts to charity.

Charities should be aware that they could be more affected if they are what is known as a Residuary Beneficiary, which is where the whole of the estate is being left to charity. The following points are a useful summary of what to be aware of in this respect:

  • Executors are only under a duty to make ‘reasonable and prudent’ enquiries to search for potential claimants of legal rights, and give them the opportunity to claim or formally discharge. However, charities should be aware there is a twenty year period in which legal rights can be claimed.

  • If Executors retain funds to cover potential legal rights claims of children under 16, this may affect the amount of residuary legacy left to charity.

  • Charities should be particularly cautious where there is a surviving spouse/children but they are not mentioned in the Will (and so their only route to receiving part of the estate would be through legal rights).

  • The best practice for charities in this instance is to be provided with a copy of the legal rights discharge where this has been done as a means of trying to protect their position from a future claim/ challenge.

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