What to Do When Someone Dies in the UK: A First-Week Checklist

In the first hours and days after someone dies, the sheer number of practical things to sort can feel almost cruel, piled on top of everything you're already feeling. If it helps at all: very little of it has to happen straight away, and none of it has to happen alone. Here is the order things usually go in, so you can take one thing at a time.

This is general guidance for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Always follow the specific advice you're given by the doctor, registrar or funeral director involved.

In the first hours

1. Get the death medically confirmed. Before anything else can happen, a doctor or coroner needs to confirm the death.

• If it was expected (during a long illness at home, say), call the person's GP, or NHS 111 out of hours.
• If it happened in hospital or a care home, the staff there will guide you through it.
• If it was sudden, unexpected, or you simply aren't sure, call 999.

2. Then stop for a moment. Once the death is confirmed, nothing else needs doing immediately. Take a breath. Tell the people closest to you. Almost everything below can wait until the next day, when your head is a little clearer.

In the first few days

3. Contact a funeral director, when you're ready. They'll bring the person into their care and help you plan everything from there. You're allowed to ring more than one and compare, and you're never obliged to go with the first you speak to. If the person left funeral wishes or a prepaid plan, mention it early.

4. Register the death. You'll book an appointment at the local register office. The deadlines are:

• England, Wales, Northern Ireland: within 5 days.
• Scotland: within 8 days.

Bring what you can: the person's full name, their date and place of birth, their address, and details of any spouse. The registrar issues the death certificate and the paperwork you'll need for the funeral. Ask for several certified copies while you're there, because banks, insurers and pension providers will each want to see one.

5. Use the Tell Us Once service. When you register, ask about Tell Us Once. It reports the death to most government departments at once (HMRC, DWP, DVLA, the passport office, the local council), which saves a great many separate phone calls at a time you have no energy for them. The registrar gives you a reference number to use online or over the phone. (It isn't available in Northern Ireland, where you contact each department yourself.)

In the first weeks

6. Notify the organisations that matter. Beyond government, you'll gradually work through:

• Banks and building societies
• Pension providers and any life insurance
• Their employer or pension scheme
• Landlord or mortgage provider, and the utilities
• Subscriptions and memberships

One small thing that helps enormously: keep a running list of who you've told and what they said. It saves you repeating the whole story on the days you can least face it.

7. Sort out the estate. If there's a will, it names an executor to handle the person's affairs. You may need to apply for probate (in Scotland it's called confirmation) before you can access larger assets. If the estate is complicated, a solicitor is worth the cost.

8. Look after yourself, too. Grief is physically exhausting, and it's easy to forget to eat or rest. Say yes to the help people offer. Free bereavement support is there whenever you want it, through your GP and organisations like Cruse Bereavement Support.

A gentler step, for later

There's no timetable on remembering someone. In the weeks that follow, a lot of families find some comfort in making a single place to gather everything: photos, stories, somewhere relatives near and far can light a candle and leave a message. An online memorial can be that place, kept for the long term with one payment. When (and only when) you feel ready, our guide on what to write on a memorial page can help with the words.

For now, just the next thing. There's no prize for doing any of this quickly.