What to do when someone dies: immediate steps

Knowing what to do when someone dies may not be intuitive especially when struggling with grief and your everyday responsibilities. We created this checklist to make this time a little bit less overwhelming and stressful for you and your family.

A Legal Pronouncement of Death

If your loved one passed at home, you will need to call 911 immediately to have them transported to the hospital where a doctor can pronounce them deceased. If they were at home under hospice care, the hospice nurse can declare them dead. If they passed in a hospital or nursing home where a doctor is present, then the staff will handle the pronouncement. In any situation, you will need the declaration of death so that you can move forward with the services planning and the estate settlement.

Telling Family and Friends of Your Loved Ones Passing

You will want to make some calls. These calls will be difficult and emotional especially if this is unexpected. This may be a good time to rely on one or two relatives or close family friends to start a phone tree. A phone tree is a layered hierarchical communication model that is used to notify specific individuals of an event. This is usually set up beforehand but can be used in any situation. An example is that you call 3-5 people to let them know and they each have 3-5 people that they are in charge of notifying and so on. This is extremely helpful to everyone as no one is burdened with the weight of notifying everyone.

You may need to go through the deceased’s phone contacts or Rolodex (if they are more old school) to figure out who needs to be contacted. Again contacting a dear friend of the recently passed would be a good way to make sure no one gets left out unintentionally.

A post on social media under your account and their account if you can get access is also helpful in getting the word out to their friends.

If your loved one was employed then make sure you are contacting the employer as soon as possible to let them know.

Caring For Pets When Someone Dies

If your loved one had pets, you cannot wait for any amount of time other than a few hours to get pet care in place. If you live nearby then bring them to your home if possible or make sure they are set up for the next few days. If you do not live close please secure a friend or family member to make sure the pets are taken care of asap. If none of that is possible, then contacting a kennel that can board them for a few days until someone can get there is a good idea.

The pets will also feel the loss and be grieving so please treat them as a member of the family or at least as someone that your loved one loved unconditionally. They will need comforting just as much as you do.

What Plans Do They Already Have In Place (if any)

Now is the time to find any plans they may have already made so that they can be respectfully followed. You may need to do some digging into their paperwork or, hopefully, you had the chance to discuss this with them beforehand and are aware of any written or pre-paid burial plans that they may have made. We are seeing more and more folks being proactive in this area and prepaying for their burial costs in a variety of ways.

If it was sudden or there were no plans left then it is time to gather the family whether in person or Zoom or a mix of both depending on location. You will need to discuss and come to some agreements on what kind of event they would have liked (funeral, celebration of life), where to have the event (church, cemetery, backyard, favorite place), and what does the budget look like.

You don’t have to plan everything by any means but having a discussion started is a good place to get the thoughts flowing.

Complete Guide on How To Plan A Celebration of Life

What to do when someone dies: immediate steps: the first days and weeks

Make Resting Place Arrangements

If they had burial plans that were pre-paid then contact that funeral home to get the plans started. If they didn’t, then you will need to contact funeral homes and decide on the location of services, whether they will be buried or cremated, and if they will need a tombstone/plaque or an urn needs to be ordered. The funeral home you choose will help you with a portion of these decisions but the family discussions will help with the larger ones.

You will need to rally the family to start with the details of the services planning or you can hire a celebration of life planner to help make the planning & execution a whole lot less stressful. Please check out my post on “4 Reasons Why You Need A Celebration of Life Memorial Event Planner” for more details on how a planner can help you. If a planner is not possible, then please check out the post I did on the “Complete Guide On How To Plan A Celebration of Life” that will help you with what you will need to get done and please make sure family or friends are there to help.

If the deceased was in the military (past or present) then you will need to contact the Veterans Administration to see if any burial benefits or funeral services can be expected and set up. This also goes for any organizations or groups that they were a part of such as the Fraternal Order of the Police, Masonic Orders, or the Knights of Columbus just to name a few. You can also look into fraternities and sororities that they may have been a part of at any time in their lives. You would, of course, reach out to those individuals and not through the veteran’s administration.

Lastly, you will need to start working on the obituary. If you are not a wordsmith then this is a great time to ask a friend or family member who is a good writer to attempt this task. I have a post on “How To Write An Obituary” that will help with what to include and how to get started no matter who is the one writing it.

How To Write An Obituary

Securing the Property After Death

If you live nearby then you will want to go make sure the house and vehicle are secured. You will also want to empty the fridge, water any plants, and get the mail brought in. If there is cash, jewelry, or other valuables, you will want to get them locked up immediately so that no one else can find them and have them walk right out of the house. If you do not live nearby, then asking a friend or family member to do this is very important. If no one is there then you may need to get a flight to their home asap.

What to Do With Someone’s Mail When They Die

You can find a forwarding order at the local post office and get their mail forwarded to you or whoever the executor of the estate/will is. There will be bills needing to be paid that you can’t just overlook, subscriptions to be canceled, and other accounts that may need dealing with. You also don’t want mail piling up at the house letting everyone know that the house is empty.

If you can gain access to their email accounts then the same goes for that. This is a wealth of information on possible accounts, subscriptions, invoices, and a myriad of other items that will need to be looked over when settling the estate.

What to do when someone dies: Within 2 Weeks After Death

How Many Copies of the Death Certificate

These will be needed to close bank accounts and cell phone plans, file insurance claims, and register the death with government agencies along with a plethora of other things. You can get these from the vital statistics office in the state in which your loved one passed or the funeral home can assist you with getting these. Most places will tell you that 10 copies will suffice but always get more than you think you will need.

The Legal Side of Someone Dying

You will need to book times and meet with the executor of the estate & will (if it is not you) to have the will read so that the loved ones' personal items can be distributed to the beneficiaries. If there is no will then the probate court will need to be filed so that the judge can name an administrator for the estate.

Meet with an attorney especially if the estate has a value of over $50,000 as things can get messy very quickly and you want to have all the legal ducks in a row. The executor of the will should be the one to pick the attorney if there is not already one in place.

Before everything is divided up you will need to take the will to probate court and they will make sure that all the deceased person's debts and liabilities are paid before items are distributed.

What To Do With Someone’s Assets After They Have Passed

You will need to make a list of all the assets such as bank accounts, cars, personal property, jewelry, and brokerage accounts just to name a few. It varies by state but this list will need to be filed in Probate Court along with the will. You can also hire an appraiser at this point to give evaluations of the listed items if needed.

Some of the assets are easy to figure out and list but you need to make sure it is an exhaustive list which means doing some digging. Comb through family records, tax returns, emails, bank accounts, brokerage accounts, deeds, titles, etc, to make sure that you are listing everything. If they have a filing cabinet, go through it all. If they have safe-deposit boxes, take a death certificate with you and go through it all. Depending on the size of the estate you may even want to hire a company to make sure that everything is found and listed accordingly.

While you are doing this digging, make sure you make another list of the bills/expenses. You need to make sure that the mortgage, utilities, and taxes are taken care of while the estate is being settled. Of course, you will also need to cancel any services no longer needed such as cell phone, cable, etc.

Who Do I Need to Notify of a Death

Social Security Administration should be notified immediately to stop any more SSA benefits from being sent to the deceased. This can be a pain to send back if received after their passing. Usually, funeral directors will do this for you but it is ultimately your responsibility so double-check. In some cases, there may be death benefits for your loved one so definitely ask when communicating with them.

Banks are the next in line to be notified. If the deceased is the sole name on the account then the bank will release the funds to the person named as the beneficiary once a death certificate is received. If a beneficiary is not named then the executor will be responsible for getting the funds to pay all debts and divide funds according to the will. This does end up being a lot more complicated and time-consuming. If the deceased has a joint account, then most likely your bank will have the automatic rights of survivorship so that the other person on the account has full access to the funds. Again, a death certificate will be necessary.

Life insurance companies should be notified so that any claims that can be made are completed. You will need a death certificate & the policy numbers to be able to complete this task.

CPAs, Financial Advisors, & Stock Brokers are next up to the plate. You first have to find out who the beneficiaries are for any accounts they have so that person can fill out any forms (with a death certificate in tow) to get access to the accounts. If they are in a trust then the executor of the trust/estate will be the one to handle these accounts. Keep in mind that there are taxes that may need to be paid upon receiving any money so check with a financial advisor or CPA to see what you will need to pay.

Credit Agencies will be next to notify. You will need to send a copy of the death certificate to one of the three major credit bureaus (Equifax, Experian, & TransUnion) letting them know so that no identity theft can be made later on. If you send it to one then they will let the others know.

Canceling and Closing Accounts After Someone Has Died

Close all credit card accounts asap. It is important to contact every customer service line for each account and inform them that the person has passed. They will give you instructions on where to send the death certificate and any balance that is on the account at that time. The executor will need to know this for each card so that they can make the final payments. If you are the executor you will need to keep meticulous records showing which card you called on what day and who you spoke to as well as how much the final balance was that was paid. Of course, you should shred the cards to keep them from being stolen. If the card was shared with another person who intends to continue to use it, take all the above steps to remove the deceased from the card.

Sidenote: If your loved one was a frequent flyer then any unused points can usually be transferred to someone else within a short time frame. It is a good idea to contact any programs they were a part of and see if this is possible to do for you.

You will need to contact the agency that issues driver's licenses to let them know of your loved one's passing. You will again need a death certificate to close the “account” but keep the license in case you need it to close other accounts of the deceased.

Get rid of any insurance policies such as health insurance or car insurance before the next bill is needing to be paid. Check all the insurance policies they may have and ask for any unused premiums to be refunded.

You may want to (at some point) close any email accounts & social media profiles but this is usually not urgent. You will need access to the email accounts for information and possibly to log into other accounts so this is very low on the list of things to do.

What to do when someone dies: immediate steps: Conclusion

We hope that this article helps you to easily navigate an already difficult and emotional time. Don’t panic if things are not getting done in a certain order or by a certain time as we all deal with things differently and in our own time.

You can download a pdf version of this checklist here to make it easier to keep track of all the to-dos.

If you are looking to honor your loved one with a celebration of life ceremony and need assistance in making it a memorable and loving event then we would love to speak with you.

What To Do When Someone Dies - A Step-by-Step Guide