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Trust Records

What are the core Trust Documents you need to keep, and who should be keeping them?

The Trusts Act sets out core trust documents that must be held and who must hold these.

The core trust documents are:
(a) the trust deed and any other document that contains terms of the Trust
(b) any variations made to the trust deed
(c) records of the Trust property that identify the assets, liabilities, income, and expenses of the
Trust and that are appropriate to the value and complexity of the Trust property
(d) any records of Trustee decisions made during the Trustee’s trusteeship
(e) any written contracts entered into during that Trustee’s trusteeship
(f) any accounting records and financial statements prepared during that Trustee’s trusteeship
(g) documents of appointment, removal, and discharge of Trustees (including any court orders appointing or removing Trustees)
(h) any letter or memorandum of wishes from the Settlors
(i) any other documents necessary for the administration of the Trust, and
(j) any documents referred to in paragraphs (a) to (i) that were kept by a former Trustee during that
person’s trusteeship and passed on to the current Trustee or Trustees.

At least one trustee must hold the core trust documents and all trustees must hold the trust deed and any variations of trust. Moving forward consideration will be needed regarding the identification, retention, storage, transfer on change of trustee and accessibility of core documents. The trustee responsible for retention of the core documents must be clearly determined.

The full document about the changes to Trusts under the new legislation is provided here but note that this was written prior to the legislation coming into effect. DOWNLOAD eBook

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