Verification of death

There are serious implications of recording a date of death on SPM in error and when a death is reported, verification will be required to ensure that the correct date is recorded and that no awards are stopped in error.

The Bereavement team is responsible for verifying a death. A death may be reported by different means. The most common ways are:

• a task will be automatically created if the client was on the Department for Work and Pensions’ National Insurance number database and the reporter has notified the Tell Us Once bereavement service. Once the Department for Work and Pensions have verified and input the date of death, the information will be sent via the CIS system which will notify SPM.
• notifications may be received from the National Records of Scotland feed.
• an individual who knew the client contacts Social Security Scotland directly to report the death and provides a death certificate signed by a registrar. This must be the original document or a certified copy where it has not been possible to verify through any of the other routes above.