Financial Next Steps After Your Spouse Passes Away
I am so sorry for your loss. When you are navigating shock and grief, the last thing you probably want to think about is paperwork and accounts. To help make things a little easier to manage, here is an (incomplete) step-by-step guide to the financial tasks you may want to approach:
Getting Started: First Steps
The funeral home may actually help you with a couple of these initial items, so be sure to ask what services they provide.
Order multiple death certificates: Ask for about 5 to 10 original, certified copies of the death certificate. Almost every bank, custodian, and insurance company will require a physical copy to process transitions, though some will kindly accept copies.
Secure passwords and digital vaults: Try to locate your spouse's password manager, phone passcode, or computer login. Having these will help ensure you aren't locked out of critical accounts or stuck in two-factor authentication loops.
Financial Accounts
Transfer inherited assets: If you are a named beneficiary or co-owner on your spouse's accounts, work with the institutions to inherit/retitle those assets into your name.
Update your own beneficiaries: Take a moment to review and update the listed beneficiaries on your own personal accounts.
Cancel credit cards: Close any credit cards or authorized user accounts that are solely in your spouse's name.
Protect their identity: File a “Deceased Notice” with the major credit agencies. This locks their credit profile and prevents scammers from opening new lines of credit in their name.
Update daily banking: Consolidate or close bank accounts as needed to simplify your finances.
Close payment apps: Deactivate Venmo, PayPal, Zelle, or any other active online payment providers they used.
Estate Plan
Meet with your estate attorney: Schedule a time to sit down with your attorney to update your own estate plan for the future.
Look into IRS Form 706: Talk to your professional team about filing the United States Estate Tax Return. This allows a surviving spouse to inherit and use their deceased partner's unused federal estate and gift tax exemption.
Get a date-of-death appraisal: To get a "step-up in basis" (which helps lower future taxes), have the home, land, business, and personal property valued as of the date your spouse passed.
Request a step-up in basis: Reach out to your account custodians to officially request a step-up in basis for after-tax investment assets.
Manage social media: Decide how you want to handle their social media profiles. For example, if you provide Facebook with a death notice, you can choose to delete the account or “memorialize” it, which freezes the account while keeping their memories and photos visible to loved ones.
Income
Reroute income streams: Review all sources of income (such as investment portfolios, pensions, annuities, or rental properties) and make sure the funds are securely routed to your new primary bank accounts.
Contact Social Security: Make an appointment with the Social Security Administration to claim the one-time death benefit. While you are there, review whether it makes sense to switch to your spouse's Social Security payment amount, if it happens to be higher than your current benefit.
Expenses
Update the household bills: Notify your utility providers of your spouse's passing and update the names and payment methods on the accounts.
Review active subscriptions: Look over automatic payments for services like Amazon, Netflix, or gym memberships. Decide which ones you'd like to keep and update the billing details, and cancel the ones you no longer need.
Manage their cell phone: Decide whether you would like to keep their cell phone service active for a little while, or if you are ready to deactivate the line.
Taxes
File the final tax return: Coordinate with a CPA or tax professional to file your final joint income tax return for the year your spouse passed away.
Adjust tax withholdings: Because your filing status will shift from "Married Filing Jointly" to "Single" (or Qualifying Widow/er) in the following tax year, your tax brackets and standard deductions will change. Reassess your paycheck withholdings or estimated tax payments to avoid any surprises.
Insurance & Benefits
Claim life insurance: Review any life insurance policies they held and file a death benefit claim with the provider.
Reach out to their employer: Contact your spouse's HR department to check on unpaid wages, prorated bonuses, accrued vacation or sick pay, and any employer-sponsored life insurance or survivor pension benefits.
Sort out health insurance: If you were covered under your spouse’s employer health plan, act quickly to coordinate COBRA coverage, transition to an Affordable Care Act (ACA) plan, or enroll in Medicare so you don't experience a lapse in coverage.
Update property and casualty policies: Call your auto, homeowners, and umbrella insurance providers to remove your spouse from the policies.
Miscellaneous
Credit card points, airline miles, online credits etc. These often don’t have a clean beneficiary attached to them. Some companies may want you to simply log in and transfer the credits to whom you want. Southwest has a policy where flight credits and points die with the member- which is one reason you should try to keep their log in information for situations like those.
Please remember to take this at your own pace, and don't hesitate to ask a trusted friend or family member to sit with you while you make these calls. Don’t be afraid to ask the same question twice or ask a financial professional (CPA, Attorney, Financial Advisor) if something seems like it isn’t right.