Footprint Online Wills Review

Footprint is an online will service and offers will packages by way of annual fee. Footprint is a sister company of professional trustee and estate administration company Perpetual Guardian.
 
Important: We have focused on the $120/year Will Package for this review, as this product is unique within New Zealand estate planning. 
 
Our view: 

1. In preparing this review, we talked extensively with Angela Vale, Footprint's CEO, as the nuances of wills and estate administration need to be discussed in detail. We have no commercial relationship with Footprint and publish this guide in good faith.
2. Footprint, at its heart, is designed to make sure your estate is distributed to your beneficiaries hassle-free while minimising the costs of doing so.
3. Our view is that Footprint has many benefits even if paying an annual fee for a will service is unfamiliar in New Zealand. Despite this, we believe that Footprint has a genuine focus and commitment to educating and empowering everyday New Zealanders regarding wills and minimising the associated responsibilities and costs of their administration. 
4. There's a lot to unpack - the lack of education around Wills makes the actual benefits of Footprint less obvious. However, we've put this review together to help explain everything you need to know about Footprint as you evaluate what's right for you and your family.

To help explain Footprint and its costs and benefits, our guide covers:

• What is Footprint, and how does it differ from online or lawyer-prepared wills?
• Other Footprint Packages and Fees
• Pros and Cons
• Alternatives 
• Our Conclusion

Know this first: Footprint isn't complicated, but to understand the nuances of Wills, estate administration and the benefits and costs of the subscription will service, we've included detailed sections to help you make sense of this innovative offering.

• Firstly, Footprint "recommends" you appoint Perpetual Guardian as the estate executor. By doing so, the total costs of your estate administration are covered, except for third party and disbursement costs.
• Footprint's "Will Package", charged at $120/year, offers free annual updates. Footprint estimates that the average estate administration cost is $10,000; this means that Perpetual Guardian is not charging any fees, unless your estate falls into the ‘very complex’ category (for example if there are assets overseas). The tasks covered by the estate administration are all normal and necessary tasks.
• Only disbursements and third-party costs (costs that anyone would have to pay family member or professional) are additional.
• The fees will cover arranging a grant of administration or probate from the High Court, legal checks to ensure your Will reflects your final wishes and the distribution of the estate to your beneficiaries.
• Our guide to wills outlines what executors do and what responsibilities they have (for example, closing bank accounts, redeeming investments, transferring or selling shares and dozens of other checks and enquiries etc.). 
• Every Will requires estate administration; while Footprint recommends Perpetual Guardian as executor for their Will Package, if you decide not to select them, they will help your appointed executor (to the point legally allowed). However, we believe a Footprint Will Package is going to be most cost-effective if you appoint Perpetual Guardian given it covers the costs of standard estate administration.
  
• Only writing a new Will and appointing a new executor of your choice will renounce that, and you won’t be compensated for the annual fees. However, with the Will Package you can update your Will annually at no extra cost – and your executor of choice would also still be supported by Perpetual Guardian.
• In conversion with Footprint, their research suggested that 95% of appointed executors pay for additional support. This means it's rare for a non-professional to successfully distribute a will without professional assistance.

The fee benefit will cover all duties of an executor including arranging a grant of administration and all other essential activities:

1. Locating and liaising with your family or next of kin following notification to the Referral Provider of your death;
2. Providing your beneficiaries with an estate management plan and regular progress and other updates regarding administration of your estate;
3. Compiling a list of assets and liabilities of the estate;
4. Dealing with the assets of your estate once a grant of administration or probate has been obtained (for example, closing bank accounts, redeeming investments, co-ordinating the sale of property and collecting proceeds of insurance policies);
5. Paying debts out of your estate’s assets (for example, funeral costs and credit card balances);
6. Recording any transmission of property by survivorship relating to any jointly owned New Zealand assets;
7. Finalising your taxation matters, including filing personal tax returns to the date of your death and dealing with any required estate tax returns from the date of your death and final distribution; and
8. Preparing financial statements for your estate and providing copies to the beneficiaries of the estate etc.

Footprint is a company owned by Complectus Group, the same umbrella parent to Perpetual Guardian, which offers similar services to state-owned Public Trust, which also offers online wills.

Footprint is a new brand. In a nutshell, and as reported by the NBR in mid-2020 when the service launched, per this paywalled NBR article. "Footprint Wills are completed by users populating a template and then checked by Footprint's team". Footprint initially launched with a single service, the subscription-based "Will Package Service", which costs $120/year per Will. It works without too much complication – you go online, complete some questions, and once you've printed out and signed the Will created using the Footprint tool, your Will becomes valid. In addition, the subscription fee gives customers access to a digital vault (to store essential documents). Finally, it covers the cost of estate administration services if Perpetual Guardian is appointed executor, valued at $10,000. If your estate administration costs more, no additional fees are charged - we explore this in detail below.

 Beyond the subscription Will service, Footprint also offers an $85/year "Will It Package" (similar to the flagship Will Package but excluding the $10,000 estate administration) and a one-off $100 Single Will service, which we outline in more detail below.

Firstly, it depends on the complexity of your estate. It will either be standard or "complex". As a background, "complex" means:

1. You own assets outside of New Zealand;
2. Your will provides for assets to be given to beneficiaries that live outside of New Zealand;
3. Your will involves an intestate estate or appoints co-executors;
4. Your estate includes a charitable trust, inheritance trust or a testamentary trust or a life interest or right of occupancy in any properties; or
5. Your estate is challenged by your beneficiaries or potential beneficiaries.

The provisions within Footprint’s Will Package and inclusions within the estate administration package can be found here.

Whether your Will situation is "standard" (i.e. no additional costs are charged to the estate) or "complex" (costs may be charged if the $10,000 allowance is reached), we've listed Perpetual Guardian's estate administration fees for relevance. These are charged to an estate as part of distributing it to its beneficiaries:

• Perpetual Guardian charges a fixed Estate Acceptance Fee of $2,500 for their executor role in administering an estate.
• This fee includes Will retrieval and review, initial meetings with family and establishment of an Estate Management Plan.
• During this process, the Perpetual Guardian administrator will work with relevant family members to establish how the estate will be administered and what to expect through the administration process. 
• After this is done, further work (which is often extensive) will be charged on an hourly basis:

1. Accountant $115 to $250/hour
2. Client Assistant $195/hour
3. Client Manager $220 to $300/hour
4. Senior or Branch Manager $300 to $400/hour
5. Specialist staff $265/hour
6. Specialist Manager - $425/hour (for Tax, Legal, Investments and Compliance)

 
All fees are exclusive of GST.

Important:

1. As outlined above, if your estate administration falls outside of the scope of the estate administration package and is classed as a 'Complex' scenario. In such a case, your estate will be charged as much as Perpetual Guardian bills to distribute your assets to the beneficiaries.
   
2. However, as the estate is not complex, there will be no additional costs charged to the estate. This is a significant advantage of the Footprint offering. For example, when it takes 30+ hours to locate and talk with local beneficiaries, the increased time doesn't matter as the estate fees are covered as per the terms and conditions. This means Perpetual Guardian won't charge for the extra time. Extra charges are only for complex estates.

Footprint offers two alternatives to its Will Package:

1. Will It – this service, charged at $85/year, deals only with the Will. It excludes the $10,000 estate administration benefit. In discussions with Footprint, we understand their team is actively educating its Will It clients about the benefits of upgrading to the $120/year service, which includes the administration service.
2. Single Will – this is a $100 one-off service, similar to that offered by LawHawk, and offers a single transaction Will service. Footprint's team checks all Wills, and phone support is offered. No ongoing services (such as the digital vault) are offered. 

 
Important – only the ongoing will packages (Will It and Will Package) offer access to a unique digital vault that we believe is useful for seeing the last version of Will for peace of mind. Arguably, Footprint's appeal is its consolidation of Wills and estate distribution processes in one place, although this won't always be evident to the beneficiaries.
 
Reward program
Footprint offers this with its Will It plan at $85/year, earning $100/year off probate and estate administration fees. The idea of this is to redistribute the annual Will fees to administration services. However, you will need to select Perpetual Guardian as the executor for this to be valid. As an example, if you contribute for 20 years, you'll pay $1,700 while your estate earns $2,000 of administration benefits.

Footprint is one of many options when it comes to writing a will. Lawyers, professional trustee companies and online solutions all offer Wills. Also, if you have a family trust, a will is most likely to be part of the package. Our guide to Wills has more details. 
 
As long as a will is signed and structured correctly, it is valid. If you need to amend your wishes (or write a new Will), you can do that in several ways. Only Footprint charges $120/year service fees for such a service.