Having Someone Declared Dead

[Oleanda]

I understand that if a person has been missing for a number of years it is possible to have them officially declared dead, but what if, rather than missing, you know that the person has died in another country, you have been informed of this by the Foreign Office, but you have been unable to obtain a death certificate. Does there come a time when you can have the person declared dead, and how would you go about it?

[woofgang]

How were you informed? can you get a written confirmation from the Foreign Office? How did they know? Are they sure?

[Buenchico]

Start here:
https://www.gov.uk/get-declaration-presumed-death/overview

[Barmaid]

The new Presumption of Deaths Act 2013 covers this. Came into force last October and first declaration was made last month.

[Oleanda]

Thank you. This person was living in Turkey, he had a stroke and died in hospital, but he didn't have any med. insurance and the hospital refused to issue a death cert. until the bill was paid. It took the family several months to raise the cash, which was then sent to the hospital, which then sent an email copy of the death certificate. This, of course, was not good enough for the authorities here, they need a proper certified copy. The hospital in Turkey claimed they could only hand this over if someone goes to collect it personally, which is not going to happen as they are in eastern Turkey. Since informing the relatives of the death, the FO have proved to be useless and less than helpful. The death occurred more than 4 years ago now, so no one is particularly interested in helping.

[atalanta]

This problem leaves a lot of unanswered questions. What happened to the body ? Was the person concerned a British citizen ? Was the nearest British consulate contacted ? If not. you could discover the address of the nearest British consul to the hospital where the death occurred, and telephone or email. Surely a member of the consulate staff could go to the hospital and pick up the certificate, even if there were to be some small charge for this service.