Beware Of Bad Planning
Heard a bit of you on CBC this afternoon and thought I’d add my own warning.
My father died with a Will that stated that everything went to his three kids and nothing was to go to his estranged wife. Since most of his assets were in a Reg’d Income Fund and he had not removed her as the beneficiary, she ended up with almost everything, in spite of the Will, as the RIF took effect the moment before death and wasn’t covered by the Will.
He had a bank account and the cheques were in his name so as the different dividend cheques arrived, I deposited them to his account. We later discovered that this had been a joint account with his estranged wife (from five years earlier) and rather than open a new account, he had just had new cheques printed with only his name on them. As joint account holder, she also took everything in the account, including the dividends I had deposited after his death.