Question of the Week

Question: If we have a joint account without rights of survivorship and one member dies, what is the best method to manage the remaining member?

Answer: Joint accounts are presumed to belong to both members on an account in equal shares, so when one member dies, half of the funds on deposit are presumed to belong to the estate of the deceased member, and the other half to the surviving member. Therefore, upon notice of death, half of the funds on deposit should be frozen in anticipation of distribution to the estate representative of the deceased member, but the remaining half should be made available to the surviving member.

Moving forward, your credit union can either remove the deceased member from the account once funds are distributed to the estate representative, or at any time move the existing member to a new account.  The latter is cleaner from a systems perspective, but may pose challenges to a member that uses the existing account for prior scheduled deposits or withdrawals, so follow your policy.