TL;DR
The Death Notification Service (DNS) is a free way to tell selected participating financial organisations about a death. Check its current member list first. Use direct contact for organisations outside the service and discuss urgent or complicated cases with the bank before using DNS.
Notification is a starting point, not proof of a financial account, entitlement to information, closure or release of money.
Every Little Thing's planned service combines a family record of Finances, Arrangements and Memories (FAM Record) with Everlynne, an AI assistant. The intended help is to connect each notification with its reply, missing evidence and next action, so the family and chosen helpers do not have to reconstruct the same history every time.
Who is signed up?
Use the official DNS member list for the current position. Checked on 18 October 2026, examples included Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds Bank, Nationwide Building Society, Natwest and Santander. This is not an exhaustive list or a promise of coverage.
Look for the exact organisation or brand. The list includes specific qualifications, such as Leeds Building Society not including Leeds Permanent Building Society accounts. Do not assume a similar name means the same coverage.
If a firm is absent, DNS directs you to contact it separately. Put that direct route in your own notes rather than marking the organisation notified through DNS.
Before sending: choose the appropriate route
DNS and Tell Us Once do different jobs. Tell Us Once reports a death to most government organisations; DNS covers selected member financial organisations. Neither replaces the other. DNS does not register the death or issue a death certificate.
For a time-sensitive or complicated case, such as urgent release of estate money, the DNS service page says to discuss it with the bank or building society first. Do not treat the online route as an emergency service.
Anyone can send a notification, but notifying does not make them an authorised estate representative. The DNS FAQ distinguishes a notification acknowledgement from substantive financial-account or estate information for the appropriate authorised contact.
How to use DNS
1. Gather the requested details
The official FAQ lists the required details: the deceased's full name, birth and death dates, and last address, plus the notifier's name, address and birth date. Financial account details can help matching but are not mandatory.
Proof of death is not required just to send the DNS notification. An individual firm may ask for it later under its own bereavement process. Do not interpret that first-stage rule as a waiver of later evidence or authority requirements.
2. Choose whether to use a DNS website account
A DNS website account is optional. The official service offers submission without one, but email confirmation requires a DNS website account. This choice is about using the DNS website, not whether the deceased held a financial account. It is not an ELT registration process.
Check any details you submit through the official service. Keep the submission date and any reference actually provided in your own notes; do not invent one if none is shown.
3. Select the participating organisations and submit
Use the official DNS service, not this guide, to notify the selected members. If someone has already submitted the death, DNS says it prevents a duplicate and directs you to its contact centre for assistance.
Keep "submitted" distinct from "firm replied". For each organisation, leave room for the evidence request or next step that may follow.
What to record for each organisation
Keep these six details in your own notes for each organisation. This guide is not an editable ELT tool or form. Do not enter private details into this guide.
- Organisation: The bank, building society or other financial firm.
- DNS member check and date: Yes, no or needs checking; record the date checked.
- DNS or direct route: The official route chosen.
- Submitted date and reference: The submission date and any reference actually supplied.
- Reply or further proof requested: Acknowledgement, account-specific next step, evidence request or no reply.
- Next action: Who will follow up, through which official route and when.
What happens after notification?
No reply yet? Record "no reply" in your own notes. If you are certain the deceased held an account with that firm and still have no contact after ten working days from notification, contact it through its official route. If you are unsure whether there was an account, ask the firm if you need confirmation. Silence is not proof of no account or closure; a firm holding no account will not write back. Discuss urgent issues with the firm directly without waiting.
Possible response and timing: If a live financial account is found, the published DNS service statement sets out contact within ten working days from notification. This is not a promise of a reply to every notifier or completed work by then.
Who can receive details: The DNS FAQ says you may receive an acknowledgement if you sent the notice. Substantive account or estate information and next steps go to the person the firm recognises as authorised to deal with the estate. That may be someone else. Sending the notice does not give you access to those details. The authorised contact follows the firm's requests for proof and authority through its official route.
Closure and money are separate outcomes: Notification or acknowledgement is not confirmation that an account is closed or money has been released. Even an accepted closure request does not confirm that the account is closed or money has been released. Track the firm's actual response.
DNS cannot tell you financial account balances, according to its FAQ. It should not be treated as a guarantee of finding all financial accounts. Requests about closure, authority or release of funds remain matters for the relevant firm.
How Every Little Thing is intended to help
Every Little Thing is designed as comprehensive practical support before or after a death. Its intended service would use the notification history to progress agreed follow-up, rather than leave a family with another disconnected list.
These names open the same planned-service explanation: FAM Record is the information foundation; Everlynne is the AI assistant intended to organise tasks, prepare approved correspondence and track replies, with human support for agreed work and exceptions. The aim is less chasing from memory and clearer handovers to the people you choose to involve.
The public service is not yet open. The link below explains planned support, not live DNS submission, bank contact, uploads, account creation or payment. Any future external action would need authority, customer approval and an accepted route; each financial organisation controls its own decisions. ELT is not affiliated with DNS or the member firms and does not provide legal or financial advice.