A woman lost her husband in 2014. Seven years later, she found herself in the High Court. Not to settle the estate, but to fight for the right to sue her former advisers. The numbers involved were significant: a family fortune of over £10 million, and an unexpected Inheritance Tax liability of £2.5 million. The core of her argument was simple. That £2.5 million tax bill should never have been issued. I have sat with families facing similar situations. The shock is profound. The fight that follows is exhausting.
The Point of Failure
The problem began years before anyone passed away. This was a complex estate with significant international assets. The husband was not domiciled in the UK. This single fact changes everything for Inheritance Tax purposes. The family had offshore trust structures, designed to be tax-efficient. But the advice they received was allegedly flawed. It failed to account for how these structures would be treated by HMRC upon the husband's death. A plan that was meant to provide security left a widow facing a life-changing tax demand and a professional negligence case that has already spanned years.
The Cross-Border Test
This is the lesson for any family with assets, or family members, outside the UK. Your estate plan must pass the cross-border test. A holiday home in France, a son working in Dubai, a parent who retired to Australia, or a non-domiciled spouse are not just lifestyle details. They are critical structural facts for your estate plan. We see plans that work perfectly on paper for a purely UK-based family, but collapse when one international element is introduced. The result is what we saw here: a £2.5 million liability that could have been avoided with specialist, forward-looking advice. The cost of getting it wrong is not just the tax. It's the legal fees, the time, and the emotional toll on the people left behind.
This is not about finding loopholes. It is about technical precision. It is about understanding the rules, both here and abroad, and building a plan that is fit for purpose. Good planning is done years in advance. It is tested. It is clear. If your own circumstances have an international dimension, we should talk.
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Written by Sean Kiani, Estate Planner at Inheritance Made Simple. Sean writes and reviews the firm's guidance on estate planning, wills, trusts and inheritance tax, and works with families across Bournemouth, Poole, Dorset and Central London. Verify Sean's Society of Will Writers membership listing.