Chain of executorship meaning

In probate practice, the chain of executorship (also called the chain of representation) describes the automatic transmission of the right to administer a testator’s unadministered estate from a deceased executor to that executor’s own executor. In England and Wales, this arises by statute: the administration of Estates Act 1925, s 7(1) provides that the executor of a sole or last‑surviving executor of the testator is the testator’s executor. The doctrine preserves continuity of administration, so the successor executor derives title from the original will and can obtain the appropriate grant without a de bonis non application. It is limited to executors and generally operates only where the deceased link died testate appointing an executor and, in practice, after proving the will; it does not apply where an executor died intestate, renounced, was passed over, or never obtained probate, in which cases a de bonis non or equivalent grant is required. Northern Ireland has materially similar statutory effect. In Scotland and Ireland, comparable continuity is achieved through their confirmation/probate frameworks, which may instead require appointment of an executor‑dative (Scotland) or a limited grant for unadministered estate; the expression ‘chain of executorship’ is less commonly used and procedures differ.