I manage the household finances. Although my husband is perfectly capable of doing it, he gladly lets me since I enjoy it. I’m an accountant, after all. But, I started thinking, “What if something happened to me?” “Would he know what to do?” He’s originally from South Africa so things like Social Security are a new concept to him. It’s so hard to think about, but I decided I needed to do something that would help him get through that possibility. Here’s what I did.
Basic Information. I put together a spreadsheet that centralizes all the information my husband would need to know about me and the household bills along with a handful of general instructions. This includes the following:
- Reminding him to not make any major financial decisions for 6 months, like selling the house
- Instructing him to collect the life insurance proceeds and not let the insurance company convince him to buy another policy
- Instructing him to get 20 to 25 copies of my death certificate
- Basic personal information (date of birth, place of birth, social security number)
- Life insurance information (name, phone number, and address of insurance company; policy number; policy value) to get the claim started
- Social Security Administration phone number to apply for surviving spouse benefits
- Information such as phone numbers and account/policy numbers for home-related bills (electric, gas, internet, cable, mortgage)
- Information relating to vehicles (where the titles are located; insurance company name, phone number, and policy number)
- All bank, credit card, and consumer loan information (financial institution name, phone number, and account number)
- Things to cancel because they’re relevant only to me (e.g. iTunes, eBay, Paypal, Amazon)
- Board of Accountancy phone number (to inactivate my CPA license)
Online
Information. On the second tab of this spreadsheet, I listed every online
account I have so my husband can log in and make changes or inactivate the
account. It has a link to the login page and information such as username,
password, security question answers, and a description of what the account is
if it’s not obvious. The most important one is my e-mail account. Since we’re
paperless, we literally get no bills in the mail. They all go to my e-mail. If
he doesn’t have access to that, he’s a goner. Alternatively, he can log into
each account and change the delivery option from paperless to regular mail.
Other Tips.
Although my husband and I have joint bank accounts and the mortgage is in both
of our names, not all the bills have both our names on them. In cases like
that, I made sure to add his name to the “authorized person” list where he can
call and the company will speak to him about the account. I wanted to ensure
that it will be easy to access everything with minimal hassle. Also, because
we’re paperless, I’ve saved every document you can think of on one memory
stick. So, if I missed anything on the spreadsheet, there’s no doubt a document
somewhere on that memory stick that will cover those gaps.
Final Thoughts.
I hope telling you what I did gives you a good general framework to help you
prepare a “what if” document that is suited to your personal situation and
structure. This is the way I think about it. People are grief-stricken when a
loved one passes away. They don’t think straight. It’s difficult to think.
Tasks that are easy seem monumental. The last thing they want to do is go
through file cabinets, drawers, closets, and wherever else to compile all the
information they need just to keep the lights on. Make it easy on them.
Preparing a “what if” document will truly be a gift.
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