As of 13 August 2026, AI can check how much probate will cost.
This still needs a person who signs their name to it.
Can you do it?
15 minutesto a draft.
30 minutesto something you’d act on.
Cost, all in£0
Skill neededchat-fluent
Who has to check ityou
What the alternative costsNo sourced alternative price is provided in the available tool data.
If this goes wrong: you budget for the wrong fee or service, and the estate incurs an unexpected cost or delay.
What to actually do
Hand it to a person
The route this page recommends
A person who owns the outcome does this end to end, worth it when the failure is dear.
Use a tool built for this
Second choiceDo it yourself
The distant thirdA chat interface, chat-fluent skill, and roughly 30 minutes until you can act on the result.
How to actually do it
- Open GOV.UK guidance on applying for probate and note the jurisdiction, current official application charge and any charge for extra copies shown there.
- Gather the will, estate summary, property and asset valuations, debts, beneficiary information, and any inheritance tax correspondence without pasting unnecessary personal identifiers.
- Collect any solicitor or probate practitioner quotation, terms of business and fee schedule, including whether VAT, hourly work, disbursements or additional applications are included.
- Paste the prompt and the gathered figures and documents into a chatbot, then answer its questions about missing assets, debts, beneficiaries and the proposed application route.
- Ask the model to produce separate confirmed, quoted and estimated costs, then compare every official charge against the GOV.UK page you opened and every professional charge against the provider's written quotation.
- Send the provider the model's list of unresolved questions and obtain written confirmation of the total scope, additional charges and who will handle any inheritance tax or complex asset work.
- Use the confirmed figures and written quotation to set the probate budget, and ask a probate solicitor for advice if the estate is disputed, insolvent, cross-border, tax-complex or otherwise difficult to assess.
Prompt
Check the likely cost of obtaining probate in England and Wales, or tell me which jurisdiction applies if the details do not fit. Use only current information from GOV.UK and the fee documents or quotations I provide. Separate the result into: official probate application charges, extra copies or certificates, inheritance tax or other government payments, asset valuation and administration costs, solicitor or probate practitioner fees, and likely incidental costs. Show each item as confirmed, quoted, or an estimate. Do not invent a fee, assume that a solicitor is needed, or give legal advice. Flag every figure that must be checked on GOV.UK or in a written quotation. Ask me for any missing information before calculating a total. My details are: jurisdiction [England and Wales, Scotland, or Northern Ireland]; approximate estate value [ ]; number and type of properties [ ]; bank, investment, pension and business assets [ ]; debts [ ]; number of beneficiaries [ ]; possible inheritance tax issue [yes, no, or unknown]; executor applying [ ]; solicitor or probate fee quotation [paste here]; other fee documents or links [paste here]. Finish with a low, likely and high scenario only where the supplied evidence supports those scenarios, and list the exact questions I should ask the probate provider. State clearly that this is not professional advice.
Open it prefilled in ChatGPT or Claude, or copy it into Gemini, which takes no prefill link.
What it gets wrong
- AI cannot know whether your estate needs specialist legal or tax work from a short description alone.
- AI cannot confirm that a solicitor's quotation includes every task, disbursement, tax service or later application.
- AI cannot guarantee that a fee shown in an old document or recalled from memory is still current.
- AI cannot take responsibility for choosing the application route or for costs caused by an incorrect assumption.
- AI cannot replace a probate solicitor where the will, beneficiaries, property or tax position is disputed or complex.
Even on a YES, the friction has a name: verification cost, stakes of error and legal accountability.
How we scored this
Five axes, each scored nought to two by hand: ten means AI carries the task cleanly, and the thresholds that turn a total into YES, PARTLY or NO are published in the methodology. Each axis name links to its definition.
| Axis | Score (0–2) |
|---|---|
| Output | 2 |
| Inputs | 2 |
| Verification | 1 |
| Liability | 1 |
| Effort delta | 2 |
| Total | 8 / 10 |
The methodology and its thresholds are published in full.
FAQ
- Can AI calculate probate fees?
- Yes. It can organise the estate details, add confirmed charges, compare scenarios and identify costs missing from a quotation. Check official charges on GOV.UK and get professional fees confirmed in writing.
- What costs are included in probate?
- The total can include the official application charge, copies or certificates, valuations, asset administration, professional fees and other disbursements. The exact items depend on the jurisdiction, estate and work included by the provider.
- Can AI tell me whether I need a probate solicitor?
- It can list factors that may make professional help useful, such as disputes, overseas assets, business interests or a difficult tax position. It cannot make that legal judgement reliably for your estate, so a serious or complex case needs a probate solicitor.
- Is it safe to use AI to check probate costs?
- It is suitable for preparing a checklist and checking arithmetic, provided you verify current official charges and written quotations. This is not professional advice, and you carry the consequences of relying on an incorrect estimate.
Nearby answers
Assessed by gpt-5.6-luna (gpt-5.6-luna) on 2026-08-13, second-checked by an independent model. Wrong somewhere? Email [email protected] and it gets re-checked.
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