How authority to administer a deceased person's estate is conferred — which grant is needed, who is entitled to it, and how it can be obtained, blocked or revoked.
Until the right person holds the right grant, the administration of most estates cannot properly begin. This chapter starts with the nature and purpose of a grant, the duties of personal representatives, and the different sources and timing of an executor's and an administrator's authority, before setting out the three principal types of grant and the assets that pass without one. It then deals with executors who step aside — renunciation, power reserved, intermeddling and the chain of representation — followed by the orders of priority to apply and when two administrators are needed, together with the special and limited grants used for minors, incapacity, incomplete administration and pending disputes. It closes with the procedural framework: inheritance tax clearance, proving copy wills, caveats, citations, passing over applicants and the grounds on which a grant may be revoked.
