IHTM35171 - Compliance with a testator's request: introduction

IHTA84/S143 applies where

• a testator 'expresses a wish' that property bequeathed by will to a legatee should be transferred by the legatee to others, and
• the legatee complies with the request within two years of the testator's death.

The requirements

The request need not be in writing, but it should have been made in terms sufficiently certain for a court to have given effect to it had it been binding. Cases in which a legatee has made a transfer allegedly in pursuance of a non-binding request, but the existence or effect of the wish appears to be uncertain, should be referred at an early stage to TG.

If the request is not complied with, it has no IHT consequences.