Can an Executor Be Paid?

Under the general law of estates, a lay executor acts in an unpaid, voluntary capacity. This can come as a surprise to executors who spend many hours dealing with paperwork, phone calls to banks, and correspondence with HMRC, sometimes over many months. The role is legally treated the same as any other unpaid trustee-type position unless the will provides otherwise.

This does not mean an executor has to be entirely out of pocket. Reasonable expenses genuinely incurred while administering the estate, postage, travel to view property, probate valuation fees, and similar costs, can properly be reimbursed from the estate's funds, provided they are reasonable and documented.

A person making a will can choose to leave their executor a specific legacy, a gift of money or an item, as a form of thanks for taking on the role, separate from any entitlement they might have as a beneficiary. This is entirely at the discretion of whoever writes the will and is simply drafted as a gift like any other.

If you are making a will and want to reward whoever agrees to act as your executor, discuss it with them directly and consider including a specific gift for that purpose, so it is clear that is what the gift is for.

If a will names a solicitor, accountant, or trust corporation as executor, that professional will charge for their time and work, usually calculated by an hourly rate or a percentage of the estate's value, set out in a charging clause in the will or agreed under their engagement terms. This is normal and expected, since acting as a professional executor is their business.

Our guide on professional executor versus family executor compares the costs and trade-offs of each option in more detail, which is worth reading before deciding who to appoint when making a will.

In some cases, all the beneficiaries of an estate can agree between themselves to pay the executor something for their time and trouble, particularly where the administration turned out to be far more demanding than expected. This is not an automatic right and depends entirely on beneficiaries' agreement, since it comes out of what they would otherwise inherit.

Any such arrangement should be documented clearly and agreed by all affected beneficiaries in writing, to avoid later disputes over whether it was properly authorised.

Even without payment for time, a lay executor should keep receipts and records for every expense claimed back from the estate, from postage and printing to mileage for property visits and probate application fees. Good record keeping here matters twice over, it protects the executor if a beneficiary later questions a payment, and it feeds directly into the final estate accounts.

If in doubt about whether a particular cost is a legitimate estate expense, it is worth checking GOV.UK guidance or taking brief professional advice rather than guessing, since claiming inappropriate expenses can expose an executor to criticism or a claim for repayment.