A grieving widow is taking on the Australian banking industry after being lumped with thousands of dollars of fees and interest from her late husband’s estate.
“Grieving families have enough to deal with without greedy banks exploiting them when they are at their most vulnerable,” Kate Vaughan said last week.
Kate’s husband, Australian skydiver Michael Vaughan died in March 2015 after suffering a mid-air collision.
He was just 45 years old at the time.
Following Michael's death, Kate contacted the major bank - which she refused to name - and chased the status of her husband's finances. She informed them that she was in the process of being granted a probate, which would allow her to take control of the accounts.
“I rang them and said, ‘I know our finances, I know there are loans sitting there going to accrue interest. Please can you give me some statements, tell me where they’re at, what can I do to pay anything off?” she told news.com.au over the weekend.
The bank, however, refused to provide Kate with details until the probate was finalised. But even then, things continued to be fraught with problems.
“Then when I did get probate and asked for a statement there was an enormous amount of money that had been racked up,” Kate said.
