How do you keep track of paperwork after a death?

Why does paperwork after a death feel so overwhelming?

After a death, the paperwork comes in waves for months. There are certified death certificates, bank and pension notifications, insurance claims, utility and subscription cancellations, and usually at least one final tax filing. On October 9, 2026, a startup called LumenUs was profiled for trying to automate this grind. Its founder, Sara Tashakorinia, lost a spouse in a car accident eight years ago and summed it up bluntly. The day someone dies, you also get “this honorary badge of a project manager for a project you had no idea about.” The company puts the administrative work after an average loss at around 570 hours. That's more than three months of full-time work, and it lands on someone who is also grieving.

LumenUs focuses on the stretch right after a death. New users describe their situation during onboarding, and the platform sorts the resulting tasks by urgency, so you can see what has to happen this week and what can wait. Sometimes it turns up money the family didn't know about, such as life insurance nobody claimed, a problem the company says is worth billions. The team is testing the product with clinicians and social workers, which says a lot about how heavy this work is. Here's the link to everything below: the admin LumenUs is tackling is a pile of deadlines, letters, phone calls and relatives to coordinate. You can manage most of it from the app you already open fifty times a day.

Here's an unpopular opinion: the hard part usually isn't knowing what to do. Checklists are everywhere, and funeral homes hand them out. The hard part is remembering what you've already done, who you spoke to and what's still waiting on someone else. Each company has its own form and its own hold music, and each one wants its own certified copy instead of a photocopy. Letters come by post, updates come by email, and the important call comes while you're in the supermarket. So it's really a tracking problem, not a knowledge problem. Tracking problems get solved by writing things down in one place, the moment they happen, somewhere you'll actually look again.

What should you do first after someone dies, and what can wait?

In the first days, the priorities are a legal pronouncement of death, telling close family, securing the home, any dependants and pets, finding the will or written funeral wishes, choosing a funeral home and ordering certified death certificates. Everything else can wait at least a week. Order more death certificates than you think you need. Ten to fifteen is a common recommendation, because banks, insurers, pension providers and government offices often want their own certified copy, and ordering more later costs time. The funeral home can usually arrange copies, or you can order them from the registry office in the place where the person died.

Over the next few weeks, the financial side starts. That means banks, pension and benefit agencies, insurers, the employer, credit card companies and the mortgage lender or landlord. Expect banks to freeze accounts held only in the deceased's name. Joint accounts often pass straight to the surviving owner, but the bank still needs to be told. Payable-on-death accounts release funds once the bank sees a death certificate. To deal with the estate, the executor usually needs a court or probate document proving they're in charge, and the details depend on the country. Rules differ between countries, banks and insurers, so check each one and get a solicitor or lawyer involved when there's property or a disputed will.

The rest can wait: streaming services, gym memberships, phone contracts, social media accounts, mail redirection, loyalty schemes. They matter, but none of them will cause real damage if they take an extra month. The exceptions are deadlines that come with penalties, such as the final tax return or an insurance claim window, so add those to your calendar now even if the work comes later. Don't try to clear everything in the first fortnight. You'll burn out, and you'll make mistakes. Sort tasks into three buckets: this week, this month and later. Then set a reminder for the first item in each bucket, like “Remind me on March 1 to check the deadline for Mum's final tax return.”

Who do you need to notify after a death?

You'll usually need to notify the government (pension, benefits and tax offices), every bank and lender, insurers, the employer, the landlord or mortgage lender, utilities, the phone and internet provider, credit card companies, doctors and dentists, and any subscriptions. In some countries, telling one of the credit bureaus helps prevent identity theft. Don't forget vehicle registration, professional bodies, clubs and charities they gave to regularly. The list is almost always longer than you expect, and that's normal. Few people know every account their parent or partner had, and nobody expects you to have the full list on day one. It grows as letters arrive.

The best map is a recent bank statement. Every direct debit and standing order is a company that needs to hear from you, from the water bill to a magazine nobody has read in years. Next, go through the post, the email inbox if you can get into it, and the contacts on their phone. Then build one master list and stop keeping half of it on the back of an envelope. In WhatsApp, that's one message to Sonic: “Keep a list of every company we still need to notify.” Add to it as you go: “Add the mobile phone provider and the gym to Dad's notify list.” When you finish one, say “Mark the gas company as done.”

Then, every time you speak to someone, record four things: the date, the person's name, the reference number and what they want from you next. It feels pedantic until the third time an insurer asks who you spoke to last month. Send a quick note right after the call: “Note: spoke to Rachel at the pension office, ref 88213, they need an original death certificate by post.” Three weeks later, when you can't remember a thing, ask “What did the pension office say they needed?” and get the answer back. A WhatsApp assistant that remembers everything is worth a lot in a month when your own memory is running on empty.

How do you stop estate paperwork deadlines from slipping through the cracks?

Turn every deadline into a reminder as soon as you hear about it, and turn every letter into one short line: what they need, and by when. Those two habits prevent most of the missed claims and duplicate phone calls. Mental notes don't work in the weeks after a funeral, and neither does a sticky note on the fridge you no longer see. Send the reminder while you're still on the phone: “Remind me to call the bank about Dad's account on Tuesday at 10.” It arrives as a WhatsApp message in a chat you check anyway, not as a notification from an app you forgot you installed. To see where WhatsApp's own reminders fall short, read about what native WhatsApp reminders can't do.

Letters are the second trap. Insurance and pension paperwork is written for compliance departments, not grieving daughters at 11pm. Take a photo of the letter or forward the PDF and ask: “Summarise this insurance letter and tell me what they need from me.” You get back the request, the deadline and any reference number, in plain English. The same works for a final utility bill, a bank statement or a spreadsheet of the deceased's accounts. You can also ask whether a charge looks like a duplicate. A summary isn't legal advice, though. For anything involving the will, probate or a dispute between relatives, take the original to a solicitor or lawyer and use the summary to prepare your questions.

Some tasks come back on a schedule, and those deserve a recurring reminder. “Every Friday at 5, remind me to check the post at Mum's flat” takes care of the mail that keeps arriving for months, and you only have to set it once. The guide to setting recurring reminders in WhatsApp covers daily, weekly and monthly patterns. If typing feels like too much, and some days it will, send yourself a voice reminder from the car park after the funeral home meeting. If you keep the estate in Google Calendar or Sheets, say “Add the probate appointment on the 14th at 11 to my calendar” or “Add a row to the estate sheet: electricity, final bill 84, paid.”

How can siblings split bereavement admin in a WhatsApp group?

Siblings can split bereavement admin by giving each person a clear set of tasks in the family WhatsApp group and letting an assistant in the group run the shared list, the reminders and the recaps. That way, no single person ends up as the default project manager. The family group already exists, so you don't need a new app. Add Sonic to it, and anyone can write “Add ‘cancel the TV licence’ to the estate list, Daniel's doing it.” Set up automatic group reminders so nobody has to nag, keep a running shared list, and run a quick poll when you need a decision: “Make a poll: which Saturday works for clearing the flat?” The brother three time zones away can ask for a catch-up recap instead of scrolling through 200 messages.

Money is where families get tense, so write it down. Who paid for the flowers, the catering or the locksmith? Log each payment in the group and let Sonic split the expenses, so nobody's quietly keeping score. When you're waiting on someone outside the family, outreach tasks can help. On the Pro plan, currently in Beta, you can say “Ask the funeral director when the death certificates will be ready and let me know.” Sonic shows you the exact first message before anything goes out. It writes from its own number as your assistant and never pretends to be you. It follows up at most once and reports back. Limits apply: one task at a time, up to three people a day, one-to-one chats only. The guide to having Sonic message people for you walks through it.

LumenUs is betting that grieving families need a dedicated platform, and for some families, especially those with complex estates, that kind of guided tool will be the right fit. If you'd rather not learn a new system in the worst month of your year, you can do most of this in the chat you already have open. None of it makes the loss smaller. What it can do is take the admin out of your head, so you have room for the people around you and for yourself. If that sounds useful, get Sonic's number here. Leave your details, and you'll be set up in WhatsApp with nothing to install.

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