Agreeing to be executor is a favour. It is also a filing position

Figures relate to tax year 2025-26 (UK) · 2025 (US)

A parent or an aunt names you executor, and years later the job actually arrives. You deal with the funeral, the solicitor, the bank and the house, and nobody mentions tax beyond inheritance tax.

Being American changes what the role involves. Running a UK estate does not move it to America. But the account you now control, the money you eventually receive, and anything the will puts into trust each carry their own American reporting.

Key takeaways

• An American executor does not make a UK estate American.
• Control of the estate bank account can create a reporting duty for you.
• A beneficiary receiving over $100,000 from abroad reports the inheritance.
• A will trust is a foreign trust, with much heavier reporting behind it.
• Income arising during the administration belongs to somebody for tax.
• Values move between date of death and the day you distribute.

What is a UK estate for these purposes?

A UK estate is everything the person owned. You gather it in, deal with it, then pass it on. According to GOV.UK guidance, probate is what gives you the legal right to do that.

The estate is a separate taxable entity in Britain during that period.

Your nationality as executor does not change where the estate sits.

Does your citizenship make it an American estate?

No. A British person with British assets leaves a UK estate, and an American executor running it does not relocate anything. The estate files in Britain and nowhere else, which is the most reassuring point in this whole area.

That is the single most reassuring point in this whole area.

Your own obligations arise separately, from what you control and what you receive.

What does controlling the estate account create?

Possibly a foreign account report in your own name. You can tell the bank what to do, even though the money is not yours. The American rules look at that control, not at who owns the cash.

Estate accounts often hold substantial sums for months.

Note the date you were added to the mandate.

Our guide to FBAR signature authority covers exactly this situation.

A worked example

The figures below are illustrative and use round numbers to show the mechanics.

James is American, lives in Manchester and is executor of his British mother's estate. The house sells for £450,000 and the estate account holds that sum for four months before distribution.

The estate itself files only in Britain. But James controlled an account holding £450,000, so a foreign account report falls due in his own name for that year.

He also inherits £200,000 himself, which is not income but does need reporting because it came from abroad and exceeded the threshold.

What each role creates

Is an inheritance taxable in America?

The capital is not income, so there is no tax to pay on it. But a large sum from abroad needs a form. It is a disclosure, not a bill.

The penalty for missing that form is a percentage of the amount received.

The threshold applies per year and per source, so two payments can be tested together.

Our guide to Form 3520 and foreign gifts covers the filing.

What about income during the administration?

Rent, interest and dividends arising during the administration belong to the UK estate, which pays British tax on them. When that income reaches a beneficiary it carries a tax credit with it.

An American beneficiary reports their share as income on their own return.

Ask the solicitor for the income certificate they issue on distribution.

So the capital and the income follow quite different paths.

Does the will create a trust?

Read the wording carefully, because many British wills do. A pot for young children, a life interest for a widow, a discretionary fund. Each one is a foreign trust in American eyes, and the reporting is much heavier.

Our guide to US settlors and trustees of a UK trust covers that ground.

If in doubt, send the will to somebody who files on both sides.

Those penalties follow the value involved, not a flat fee.

How to handle the role

1. Read the will and note whether it creates any trust.
2. Establish which beneficiaries are American.
3. Record when you gained access to the estate bank account.
4. Track the highest balance that account reaches each year.
5. Value the assets at the date of death and keep the evidence.
6. Record what each beneficiary receives and when.
7. File your own foreign account report for any year you held access.

What about the currency movement?

Values move between the death and the hand-over, sometimes by a lot. Britain works in pounds throughout, while an American beneficiary needs dollar figures on the right dates to report anything properly.

Record the rate on the date of death and on each distribution.

Reconstructing those rates years later is slow and avoidable.

What if the estate holds American assets?

Then a second layer appears, because American-situated assets can attract American estate tax even inside a UK estate. Shares in American companies and property over there both count towards that charge.

That charge falls on the estate rather than on you.

Our guide to US estate tax for UK investors explains the exposure.

How long does the obligation last?

Your account reporting runs for every year you hold access. For a complicated estate that can mean two or three returns rather than one. It ends when the account closes, not when probate arrives.

Estates holding property often run for two or three years.

Ask the bank to remove you formally once the account closes.

Can you decline the role?

Yes, provided you have not started acting. Renouncing is straightforward before you intermeddle in the estate, and it becomes considerably harder once you have begun dealing with any of the assets.

Professional executors can take the role instead.

Decide early rather than after opening the account.

Does it affect your own tax return otherwise?

Only through what you receive yourself. The role is not a job and it pays nothing at all, unless the will sets a fee for the executor. Where a fee does exist, it is taxable in the ordinary way.

Professional executors charge a fee and pay tax on it.

Family executors usually act without payment.

What records should you keep?

The will, the grant of probate, the estate accounts, and a note of every payment out with its date. Add the bank statements showing the highest balance each year, since that figure drives your own report.

Beneficiaries will need those figures for their own returns.

Sending them a short summary saves everyone work later.

Should you tell the beneficiaries early?

Yes, especially the American ones. Somebody expecting a six figure inheritance needs to know a disclosure is coming, and the deadline follows the year of receipt rather than the year of death.

A line in your covering letter is enough.

Ask each of them whether they hold an American passport or a green card.

Most people have never heard of the requirement.

Does a solicitor handle any of this?

The British side, yes, and usually very well. The American side sits outside their remit entirely, so nobody in the chain has any reason to raise it with you at all.

That is why these obligations surface so late.

Ask the question yourself rather than waiting.

What if you live in America?

The role works the same way, though the practical side gets harder. British banks and the probate registry expect British paperwork, and some will not deal with an address abroad without extra checks.

A British solicitor can act alongside you.

Allow extra weeks for certified documents to travel.

Your own reporting is unchanged either way.

Are there joint executors?

Often, and each one is looked at separately. A British co-executor has no American duties whatsoever, while you have yours, even though the pair of you are doing exactly the same job.

Both of you may hold access to the same account.

Only the American one reports it.

When should you get advice?

Before the estate account opens, ideally. Setting the records up at the start costs an hour of somebody time. Rebuilding them two years later costs considerably more and never works as well.

A quick read of the will is the first job.

Everything else follows from what it says.

Does the size of the estate matter?

For your own reporting, only through the balances. A small estate may never pass the account threshold, while a house sale pushes almost any estate past it for one year.

The beneficiary disclosure has its own separate limit.

So a modest estate can still produce one of the two filings.

What if the deceased was American?

Then the picture changes entirely, because an American decedent brings American estate tax on worldwide assets and a final personal return. That is a much larger exercise than administering a British estate.

The British side continues alongside it.

Get advice immediately rather than starting the British process alone.

Does a lifetime gift complicate things?

It can, where the person gave money away in the years before dying. Britain looks back seven years for inheritance tax, and an American recipient may have had a disclosure due at the time.

Those earlier forms are often missing.

Those earlier forms are often missing. Our guide to US-UK inheritance tax covers how the two death tax systems interact.

How long do estates usually take?

Six months to a year for a simple one, and two or three years where property has to sell or a dispute arises. Your account reporting follows that timeline rather than any fixed period.

Each calendar year with access needs its own report.

Diarise it annually until the account finally closes.

Mistakes and penalties we see with a UK estate

The first is assuming a UK estate creates nothing for the executor. The bank access alone often does.

The second is missing the inheritance disclosure because no tax was due. The form falls due regardless.

The third is overlooking a trust buried in the will, which carries the heaviest reporting of all.

The fourth is distributing before anyone has checked which beneficiaries are American.

How US UK Tax Accountants helps

We read the UK estate will for trust provisions, identify which beneficiaries carry American obligations, and set up the records so the account reporting and the inheritance disclosures are straightforward when they fall due.

We also handle the beneficiary filings themselves. Our treaty relief service covers the wider planning.

If a will names you executor and you file in America, get in touch before you open the estate account. The record-keeping is far easier set up at the start.

Last reviewed 3 October 2026. This article is general information and not personal tax advice. Every estate turns on its own facts, so take advice on yours before acting.