What we do,
and what we don't.
Signum is a records and readiness bureau, built to the Estate Standard 2026. The most useful thing we can tell you is exactly where our work ends — so you always know who's allowed to do what.
Anyone can promise to help. We'd rather tell you the line.
The boundary, in full
Two columns, no small print. Everything Signum does itself, and everything it hands to a regulated professional.
- Locate, gather and organise your records
- Index and name them to the Estate Standard 2026
- Chase missing structural details — a missing policy number, an unrecorded account
- Draft your will from your instructions (an unreserved service)
- Compile your physical and digital readiness dossier
- Issue a Readiness Letter: what exists, what's missing, what to do next
- Explain, in general terms, how inheritance tax, probate and LPAs work
- Keep it current and schedule reviews
- Personal recommendations on your pensions, investments or insurance (regulated financial advice)
- Bespoke inheritance-tax planning, or interpreting trust structures
- Probate, grant applications, or estate administration (a reserved legal activity)
- Acting as your executor or representative
Regulated or reserved work — only ever done by the regulated party. The dark panel below sets out how the hand-off works.
Where regulated or reserved work is needed — probate, a personal financial recommendation, complex tax — we coordinate it: a Signum specialist briefs a panel solicitor or adviser. The regulated work is always done by the regulated party.
Why we draw it so plainly
The boundary isn't a limitation we apologise for. It's the reason the work is reliable.
The line is the law, not our policy
Probate is a reserved legal activity and personal financial recommendations sit behind the FCA perimeter. We don't decide where the line is — we just keep to the right side of it, and tell you plainly which side any task falls on.
Records are where families actually get stuck
When someone dies or loses capacity, the regulated work rarely fails first. What fails is finding the policy, the password, the deed, the executor's name. That's the gap Signum is built to close — and it's unregulated, so we can do it properly.
A clean hand-off beats a vague promise
When regulated work is needed, an organised dossier makes a solicitor or adviser faster and cheaper. We brief them; they do the reserved work. You're never left holding a half-answer from someone who wasn't allowed to give it.
A free assistant that explains how it all works, drafts your will from your answers, and helps organise what you have — then routes anything regulated to a real adviser.
- Explains inheritance tax, probate, LPAs and the rest in plain terms
- Drafts a will from your instructions (unreserved)
- Helps organise and name your records to ES-2026
- Flags what's missing and what to ask a professional about
It never makes a personal financial recommendation or does reserved legal work — it routes those to an authorised professional.
An Engagement Lead, not a queue
From your intake call onward, one named Engagement Lead owns your file. They run your Build Session, write your Readiness Letter, and decide — on the record — which tasks Signum does and which go to a panel solicitor or adviser. When a hand-off happens, they brief the professional and stay your point of contact. You don't get passed around, and you never have to wonder who's responsible for the line.
Start with a 20-minute intake.
Free — a 20-minute call. We'll scope the work, tell you which parts are ours and which we'd coordinate, and what your build would involve. No obligation.
Book an intake