Legacy Protection Services For Charities

Legacy protection services for charities

According to the Institute of Fundraising, UK charities received an estimated £3billion from legacies in 2018 with that figure set to rise by nearly £600m by 2024.¹

While that’s great news for charities, with it brings potential challenges including a greater need for investment and support, increased competition in the legacies sector and an inevitable rise in legacy disputes.

We understand how vital legacy income is for our charity clients and how important it is to protect, while also balancing risk, reputation and regulation.

As recognised leaders in the field, and with one of the largest teams in the UK, our specialist lawyers have over 50 years’ combined experience and a strong track record of achieving results for our clients.

We advise on:

Will and legacy disputes
Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975 claims
Probate and estate disputes
Ex-gratia payments, cy-prés and other applications for schemes and compromises
High Court and Charity Commission applications
Funeral and burial disputes
Trust disputes
Property and asset claims
Proprietary estoppel, resulting and constructive trust claims
Will, trust and estate professional negligence claims
Cross-border estate and offshore trust disputes
Rectification and construction claims
Court of Protection disputes

If your charity is faced with a will, trust or estate dispute, we’re here to help protect your legacy.

¹According to research conducted by Legacy Foresight

Key contact

Roman Kubiak is a partner and head of the market leading Contested Wills, Trusts and Estates team.

He advises across the whole spectrum of private wealth disputes, with a particular focus on high value, complex and cross-border disputes including: trust disputes, breach of trust claims and applications to remove trustees; will disputes, particularly those with an international element; claims under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975; and claims for equitable relief under proprietary estoppel, constructive trusts and resulting trusts.

Our experience

Hugh James advises on construction of charitable legacy

We advised in relation to the construction and validity of specific gifts of properties in a will to a leading cancer charity with the condition that the properties were retained and not sold. The residuary beneficiary was another leading cancer charity.

We provide advice to the charities on whether or not the condition was valid given the general rule that a condition attached to a property which purports to restrict a donee’s right of “alienation” is void as “repugnant” to the gift.

We were delighted to be able to help the charities negotiate a compromise which avoided both High Court action or an application to the Charity Commission.