Update your superannuation details
You might think I am going to talk about a Binding Death Benefit Nomination, and they are important, but I actually want to talk to you about something else.
Do you know how many superannuation accounts you have? As in, are you really sure that you know how many superannuation accounts you have? Does your family know how many superannuation accounts you have? Do they know who you hold your superannuation with?
There are a lot of reasons you may not know, there are lots of reasons a person may have a second account they are unaware of. For instance, if you are old enough to have worked during the time when your employer chose or nominated your superannuation then you should really be checking for an old account floating around. Even now a lot of people were probably put into whatever the “industry” superannuation fund was when they started work at their first job, and they haven’t really thought about that account again.
There is $19 billion in unclaimed or lost superannuation as of October 2025, (see here) and I believe that a huge amount of this belongs to Estates. Back in the days of snail mail we would frequently see superannuation statements turn up late in the administration process, after applying for Probate, sometimes after we had started distributing the Estate to the beneficiaries. Now that everything has been forced over to “paperless” statements we don’t see this happening as much. I do not believe that Australians have generally gotten better at record keeping, I believe more superannuation is being missed because the Executor doesn’t know about it.
Assets can change
The thing about assets is that they naturally change over time, as your needs change. If your family don’t have an up to date list of where your assets are, they might be looking for the wrong type of asset.
If you have combined two smaller superannuation funds into a different fund then this isn’t always easy for your family to figure out. There are more than 500 retail superannuation funds in Australia, the Executor cannot write to all of them. If superannuation has been transferred out, even if the family remembers the original fund, it is not always clear where it went. The superannuation fund you have left probably won’t keep records of where you went. A lot of time can be spent on these searches but also, beneficiaries can be absolutely convinced that a certain fund still exists and the Executor just hasn’t found it yet. Even if you prove that the fund was cashed out this beneficiary can be convinced that it was definitely reinvested in shares or superannuation. This can cause unnecessary stress at at time when there are more important things to focus on.
Find my Super on MyGov
If you are looking for your own superannuation you can to go MyGov and do it almost immediately, certainly this is a less than 20 minutes task. You can find out more about the process here. You should then take a screen shot of the results and save the results wherever you are saving your Estate Planning information. Why? Because you are saving a lot of time and delay for the Executor, as well as implicitly saying to the beneficiaries that you agree with this information. The beneficiaries won’t feel that the information is incomplete, because you have sourced it.
Also, what if you do have a super fund somewhere that you have forgotten about? Wouldn’t it be better to know that now?
Can your Executor do it? The answer used to be no, not at all. There is now a new system where they can do it, but the Executor cannot log into your MyGov and get it virtually immediately, the way that you can. Dealing with the ATO as an Executor is a difficult and time consuming process, starting with posting them a variety of paper documents and having someone at the ATO admit to receiving those documents. Also the ATO will only go back three years for the Executor, I have no idea how that impacts the find my Super process and I cannot find information telling me what that means. Let’s say that this system works though, and it takes them six months after your death to find your superannuation, now that the Executor has found it how much longer will it take your family to receive that superannuation? Additionally your Attorney can not do this. So if you need to draw down that super and insurance because you have had a catastrophic injury then the Attorney is one step further behind, they aren’t even sure whether they know what all of your superannuation accounts are.
The thing about this search is, it is more than giving them the superannuation account statement. You should do that too, but by giving them a screen shot of this search you are saying this is it, this is all of them, you don’t have to look any further. Help them out, tell them where it is.
Should I update my superannuation BDBN too?
No, please don’t do that without speaking to a lawyer, your accountant or your financial adviser. Definitely go and find these superannuation accounts, get a statement from them (like just the statements they send out) and then show it to your lawyer or financial adviser, but please don’t go combining or updating anything without advise.
Why not? Did you know that you cannot leave your superannuation to your parents using a BDBN?
Do you know what your life insurance is? Do you know which superannuation funds that you are currently with offer TPD insurance?
What I want you to do at the moment is find your superannuation, and record that information in your life admin email account. What is a life admin account? Read more about that below.
A paperless world and a paper based Estate
While every organisation is trying to force you to do things in a paperless fashion, often those same organisations (for instance banks, superannuation companies and Telcos) will require an Estate to do everything by paper, by snail mail, with original ink to paper signatures. These systems are not set up to make things easier or simpler for your Estate.
You can reduce so much stress for your family if you could do some homework for them now, and the great thing is that it is all life admin that you really should do anyway. You really should make sure that you have a back up for all your emails and social media accounts, and you really should make sure that you have a list of your accounts and insurance policies (but NOT any passwords) in case you lose your wallet or need to quickly make an insurance claim. You should know how many superannuation accounts you have, like really know, and then know if your BDBN is up to date. Almost all of the things in this list will help you in life, as well as helping your family when you die. You are reducing stress for them, as well as reducing stress for yourself in the future.
Ready to get started?
Are you ready to get started on your Estate Plan? Perhaps you just need to update your Power of Attorney and your medical decision making documents? You can book in your first appointment with me to get started. Head on over to the Services tab of my website.
If you have any questions please feel free to send me an email (the email address is in the footer of this blog post) or DM me on social media.
