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Families very often assume the opportunity died with their relative. It usually did not. A Continuing Healthcare claim survives death, and because these claims can cover years of fees, they are frequently the largest single asset in an estate that nobody knew existed.
Where fees were paid that the NHS should have covered, the executor or administrator can pursue the claim, and any refund is paid into the estate for distribution under the will or intestacy rules.
Claims can cover care provided from 1 April 2012 onwards. Where a claim succeeds, the NHS repays the fees for the relevant period with interest.
You do not need to have all of this before speaking to anyone. Obtaining care records is part of the work, and the care home is obliged on reasonable request to produce them.
Yes. The right of access does not end at death. A personal representative can obtain the deceased's health and care records, and care providers are expected to produce current records within about two weeks and archived records within about four.
In practice this is where claims stall — records arrive late, for the wrong period, or incomplete. Chasing them properly is much of the work, and it is a large part of what a specialist is actually for.
For a period where eligibility was never assessed, there is no fixed deadline to request a retrospective review. But delay costs you evidence: care homes change hands, record systems are replaced, and staff who could explain an entry move on.
If a decision was made and refused during your relative's lifetime, that is different. An appeal must normally be brought within six months of the decision letter, and a retrospective claim cannot be used to revive a missed appeal.
Two practical points executors often miss.
First, a successful claim can substantially change the value of an estate. If distribution has already happened, recovering and redistributing is possible but far more difficult — so it is worth investigating before the estate is wound up, not after.
Second, a potential CHC claim is an asset of the estate. An executor who is aware of it has that in mind when administering the estate. If you are acting as executor and your relative self-funded care after April 2012 without ever being assessed, it is worth establishing the position rather than assuming there is nothing there.
Families sometimes hesitate, feeling that a claim is somehow reopening a difficult period, or that it looks mercenary.
It is neither. If the NHS was legally responsible for that care, the money was never the family's to spend in the first place. Recovering it is not a windfall — it is putting right a decision, or an absence of one, that should have gone differently at the time.
If your relative self-funded care after April 2012, it is worth establishing whether a claim exists before the estate is distributed. Free review, no obligation.
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