Receiving mail for a deceased person can be frustrating and in some cases painful. If you are, or were, an Executor of a deceased person’s estate, you most likely had the Post Office forward their mail to your address. However, this results in you receiving not only important mail you need, but all other types of mail, too. After the estate is settled, you may continue to receive mail addressed to the person.
You may not be the Executor, but receive mail at your home if you shared a residence/address. Perhaps you purchased your new home from a deceased person’s estate and receive mail addressed to them. Regardless of the situation, there are steps you can take to reduce and eliminate such mail. Remember, it is a federal offense to open and read someone else’s mail. Unless you are a legal representative of the deceased person, do not open their mail.
- Register the deceased person on the Deceased Do Not Contact (DDNC) List administered by the Direct Marketing Association (DMA). It helps to remove the deceased person from commercial direct marketing lists and is a good step to take immediately. There is no fee to register a name. Even the US Postal Service recommends, and links, to the DDNC. All DMA members are required to remove names on this list from their mailing lists. In addition, many non-DMA members have access and use the DDNC to remove names. Once the deceased is registered, mailings should begin to decrease within 90 days. To learn more and register a name visit https://www.ims-dm.com/cgi/ddnc.php. If you don’t want to click the link, simply search for “Deceased Do Not Contact List.”
- You can request that the Post Office forward ALL of the person’s mail to another address. This can be helpful if you are not the Executor and shared a residence/address, or if you are an Executor and need all of the person’s mail sent to you. However, the Post Office only honors forwarding requests for one year from the date the request was submitted.
- You can forward a single piece of mail to an appointed Executor by:
- Neatly crossing out your address
- Printing “Forward to” and adding the new address on the envelope
- Leaving the envelope in your mailbox, or dropping it off at the Post Office
- For subscriptions or mail from organizations that the deceased person patronized while they were living, contact the organization directly to inform them of the death.
- You can write “Deceased, Return to Sender” on any mail addressed to the deceased person and leave it in your mailbox for return.
- If you are the Executor of an estate that has been through probate court, contact the deceased person’s local Post Office and send or deliver in person a copy of the probate order closing the estate and dismissing you as the Executor, and request that all mail service be stopped immediately. You may have to complete a formal request form.