Hospice care wouldn’t exist without people like you.
By leaving a gift in your will, you can help hospice care live on for all, for now, forever.
Leave a gift in your will
Why leave a gift in your will?
Gifts in wills are crucial to the survival and growth of hospices across England, Scotland and Wales, providing 15% of the voluntary income that hospices rely on to deliver essential care.
Hospice care is free at the point of use. But, unlike the NHS, it is not fully state funded. While hospices receive some government funding, more than £1 billion of the £1.6 billion they need each year comes from generous donors.
With rising costs and growing demand for hospice services, these gifts are more important to us than ever.
A gift in your will can help make sure hospices like ours can continue to offer compassionate, free care to children and their families, now and in the future.
How do you leave a gift in your will?
Leaving a gift in your will is incredibly simple.
It’s simply a short instruction in your will which lets people know that you want someone (in this case, our children’s hospice) to benefit from your estate after you die. All you need is our name (Forget Me Not Children’s Hospice) and our registered charity number (1110457).
Did you know?
- Anybody can leave a gift in their will, no matter the size of their estate.
- It costs nothing now to include a gift in your will but the impact of your gift will last long into the future.
- You don’t have to leave a lump sum. Instead you can leave a percentage of your estate to your chosen charity.
- Every penny of your gift will go towards helping local children and their families.
- Gifts to a charity are exempt from inheritance tax, income tax and capital gains tax. So when you gift it to a charity like ours, your money can go further and do more.
Make your will for free!
If you die without having made a will, the law decides how your estate gets divided up – and your family and friends have no say in the matter. Everything you own could go to the government, and the people and charities you care about most could get nothing. So be sure to make a will: that way, your wishes will be cast in stone.
March is Free Wills Month so it’s the perfect time to get yours sorted if you don’t yet have a will. And, unlike some other charities, our free wills offer is open to all adults over 18. Our free will-writing service is in partnership with Farewill, the UK’s largest will-writing service.
Frequently asked questions
Find the answers to some commonly asked questions about leaving a gift, answered by Ellie Hirst, private client solicitor at Chadwick Lawrence Solicitors.
There are different types of gift that that can be left in your will. This can either take the form of a specific gift (an item), a pecuniary gift (a cash sum), or a percentage share of the estate (the residuary estate that is left after debts and liabilities have been discharged). A percentage may be beneficial instead of leaving a legacy which may reduce in value due to inflation. This way, Forget Me Not will receive a proportional gift depending on your personal wealth.
You will need the charity’s full name, address and charity number which are:
Forget Me Not Children’s Hospice
Russell House, Fell Greave Road, Huddersfield, HD2 1NH
RCN: 1110457
Aside from the fact that any gift helps tremendously in continuing our work, there are taxation benefits to leaving a gift in your will to a charity. Any gift to a charity is exempt from inheritance tax, and you may qualify for a lower rate of inheritance tax if you leave a certain percentage of your estate to charity.
We recommend that you include the gift in your will but express where you would wish for your funds to be used in a separate Letter of Wishes to guide your executors.
You should consider who you would appoint to act as your executors who are the person(s) who would administer your estate. You should also consider who you would wish to look after your children, and where you would wish for your personal wealth and items to pass.
We recommend that you seek independent professional legal advice when writing or updating your will to enable you to obtain advice on inheritance tax which is tailored to your personal circumstances. This is because differing tax rules apply to each individual’s circumstances. Advice can also be given on succession planning in the interests of care home fee planning and where couples have children from prior relationships.
If you already have a will, you can simply create a new one, as a new will automatically revokes a previous will. If you just wish to leave a legacy to the charity but keep the rest of your will the same, it is possible to add a ‘codicil’ which is essentially an addendum to your will.
Special inheritance tax rules apply to gifts to charity. Any gift to a charity is exempt from inheritance tax and if you leave a specific percentage of your will to charity, then you may qualify for a lower rate of inheritance tax.
You can simply change your will if you change your mind or your personal circumstances change. There is no limit on the amount of times that you can update your will. We always recommend that you change/review your will if your circumstances change in any event to ensure that it still accords with your wishes and is tax efficient.
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