When a DIY Will Goes Wrong: A Glasgow Sheriff’s Warning to Scottish Families

A Glasgow Sheriff has reduced a homemade Will after finding that the deceased’s daughter had procured it from her dementia-affected mother through facility and circumvention. The case is a stark reminder that DIY Wills, particularly those involving elderly or vulnerable family members, are open to legal challenge in Scotland. A professionally drafted Will, supported where appropriate by independent medical evidence, remains the most reliable way to protect your wishes and your family from costly disputes after you are gone.

The recent decision in Scott v Reeves [2026] SC GLA 57, reported by Scottish Legal News and issued in full by the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service, is a sobering read for anyone thinking about how their estate will be handled after their death. It also speaks directly to families who suspect that an elderly relative has been pressured into changing a Will. Sheriff Anthony Deutsch found that a daughter had used her dominant role as her mother’s principal carer to procure a homemade Will that effectively disinherited two of her siblings. The judgment sets out how the Scottish courts approach challenges based on facility and circumvention and undue influence, and it stands as a textbook example of why writing a Will should never be treated as a do-it-yourself project.

Mrs Ruby Scott died in March 2021 at the age of 77. She had been diagnosed with vascular dementia in September 2018. Her original Will, prepared by solicitors in October 2011, divided her Glasgow home equally between her son Allan and two of her daughters, Lorna and Jacqueline, in the event of her husband’s prior death.
After Mrs Scott’s death, a second document came to light: a two-page DIY Will, dated 25 April 2019, written out in the handwriting of her daughter Lorna and leaving Lorna effectively in sole control of the estate. Allan raised an action of production and reduction, asking the court to set the second Will aside.

The case had one extraordinary feature. The pro forma DIY Will template used had not been published until November 2019, more than six months after the date written on the document. The Sheriff concluded that the date had been written deliberately, in an attempt to make the Will appear contemporaneous with a capacity certificate produced for Mrs Scott’s Power of Attorney, which had been signed in February 2019.

The court also heard powerful evidence from a third sister, Linda Gettie, who stood to gain nothing under either Will. She described how Lorna had become the gatekeeper to her mother’s life: organising family events without inviting the other siblings, removing photographs of family members from the home, and threatening to withdraw care if her decisions were challenged. Mrs Gettie also gave first-hand evidence of her mother’s increasing frailty, anxiety and confusion in the period when the second Will was supposedly granted.

Sheriff Deutsch reduced the second Will, finding that it had been obtained through both facility and circumvention and undue influence.

Facility and circumvention is a long-established Scots law doctrine that allows a deed, including a Will, to be set aside where three things are proved.

The first is facility, meaning a state of mental weakness that leaves a person seriously susceptible to pressure from others. As Lord Glennie put it in the leading case of Smyth v Romanes’s Executors [2014] CSOH 150, “facility is a spectrum: it varies in degree, and it may be permanent or temporary. It can be brought on by old age, infirmity, dementia, pain, grief or illness”.

The second is circumvention, the improper pressure applied to take advantage of that weakness. It can be obvious bullying or coercion, but it can equally be quiet, persistent solicitation. The court does not need to find fraud; the question is simply whether pressure has been applied that the person, in their weakened state, was unable to resist.

The third is lesion, which simply means harm or loss. In a Will challenge, the very fact that a new Will has been granted in favour of the alleged perpetrator is normally enough to satisfy this requirement.

Importantly, the courts look at these three elements together. Strong evidence of facility may compensate for less direct evidence of circumvention, particularly where, as in most family Will disputes, the actual interactions between the deceased and the alleged perpetrator are unknown.

Undue influence is a separate doctrine, although the same evidence often supports both grounds of challenge. It is concerned with the abuse of a relationship of trust and confidence.

The classic statement comes from Lord President Inglis in Gray v Binney (1879). Where the relationship between two people gives one of them dominance and ascendancy over the other, that dominant party owes a duty not to abuse that position for their own benefit. If they do so, especially in the absence of independent advice, the courts will infer undue influence and set aside any deed that flows from it.

In Scott v Reeves, three factors were decisive on this issue: the daughter’s dominant position over her mother in respect of finances, health and care; her substantial benefit under the new Will; and the absence of any independent legal advice when the document was signed. Taken together, the Sheriff said, those factors raised an “inescapable inference” of undue influence.

The Sheriff’s reasoning is worth setting out plainly because it shines a light on the kinds of facts that move a court in this type of case.

The medical evidence, supported by direct observation from a family member, established that Mrs Scott was facile at the relevant time. She suffered from significant dementia, intermittent delirium, anxiety symptoms and serious physical frailty. According to the Scottish Government’s national dementia strategy, an estimated 90,000 people in Scotland live with dementia, a figure projected to rise sharply over the coming two decades. Cases like this one show why early planning matters so much, and why a sensible Power of Attorney conversation with a solicitor is so valuable while there is still time.

The way the second Will was created supported the inference of circumvention. There was no legal advice. The document was a pro forma template, completed in the handwriting of the principal beneficiary, and witnessed in circumstances the Sheriff did not find credible.

The deliberate misdating was particularly damaging. The Sheriff found that the daughter had been told by her mother’s GP that any later legal document should be supported by a contemporaneous psychiatric capacity assessment. A second Will dated April 2019 would appear to be covered by the capacity certificate already obtained for the Power of Attorney. The fact that the date was written incorrectly pointed, in the Sheriff’s words, to an “understanding on the part of the first defender that something irregular had taken place”.

It would be tempting to read Scott v Reeves as a one-off: an unusual case involving very particular family dynamics and a clear breach of trust. But the broader warning runs deeper. Homemade and DIY Wills are routinely struck down or rendered ineffective in Scotland for far more mundane reasons, as we set out in our article on DIY Wills in Scotland and the common problems they cause.

A homemade Will may not be properly subscribed and witnessed in line with the Requirements of Writing (Scotland) Act 1995. It may use language that is ambiguous or that fails to deal with the whole estate. It may overlook Legal Rights, the protected entitlement of children and a surviving spouse or civil partner under Scots law. It may name an executor without giving them the powers they need or fail to name one at all. And, as Scott v Reeves shows, it may be open to challenge years later because no independent solicitor was involved at the point of signing.

Each of those problems is fixable in advance. None is easy to fix once the testator has died.

If you believe that a Will has been obtained from a vulnerable family member through pressure, manipulation or fraud, you should seek legal advice as soon as possible. The longer the delay, the harder it becomes to gather evidence and the more likely it is that the estate will already have been distributed.

Be ready to discuss your concerns honestly. The kind of evidence that mattered in Scott v Reeves included medical records and GP notes, the testimony of family members and carers who knew the deceased well, the circumstances of the signing of the Will, and the conduct of the principal beneficiary in the years before the Will was made. None of this is straightforward to assemble, and specialist advice is essential.

Wallace Quinn has been advising families across Glasgow, West Lothian and the wider central belt of Scotland on Wills, Powers of Attorney and estate matters for more than three decades. Our Personal Life team draws on years of combined experience helping clients put their affairs in order, with particular care for those advising on behalf of older or vulnerable relatives.

When you instruct us to prepare a Will, we take the time to understand your family, your assets and your wishes. Where appropriate, we will recommend that capacity be evidenced by your GP or a consultant, so that the Will is as resilient as possible to any future challenge. We also offer Power of Attorney drafting, estate planning advice and executor services, so that your family is supported at every stage.

If you are concerned about a Will that has already been signed, or you suspect that an elderly relative has been pressured into changing theirs, our team can offer an initial conversation in confidence and point you toward the right specialist support where needed.

To talk to us about making or updating your Will in Scotland, call our Baillieston office on 0141 771 3911, our Livingston office on 01506 353400, or use our contact form to arrange an appointment. A short conversation now can save your family years of heartache later.

A: A handwritten or DIY Will can in principle be valid in Scotland if it meets the requirements of the Requirements of Writing (Scotland) Act 1995. In practice, homemade Wills are frequently poorly drafted, fail to deal with the whole estate, or are vulnerable to challenge. They are a false economy, particularly where the testator is elderly or unwell.

A: No. A Power of Attorney gives an attorney authority to act on someone else’s behalf in financial or welfare matters during the granter’s lifetime. It does not give the attorney any right to write, alter or sign a Will on the granter’s behalf. A Will must always be made personally by the testator, and only when the testator has the necessary capacity. Our article on Power of Attorney and dementia explains why the two documents serve very different purposes.

A: Use a Scottish solicitor to draft your Will. Speak openly to your family about your wishes where possible. If you are elderly or unwell, ask your solicitor to recommend a contemporaneous medical opinion on your capacity. Keep your Will up to date as your circumstances change, and store the original somewhere safe. Our article on updating your Will in Scotland sets out when a review is sensible.

A: Online and shop-bought Will templates are unregulated, are not tailored to Scots law, and provide no legal advice. They can lead to expensive disputes after death and, as Scott v Reeves shows, can leave a Will vulnerable to challenge in court. The relatively modest cost of a solicitor-drafted Will is small compared to the cost of resolving a dispute later.

If you liked this, you might also like these articles:

• ❇️ DIY Wills Scotland: Common Problems and How to Prevent Them
• ❇️ Can an Unsent Letter Change a Will? Lessons from a Recent Scottish Case
• ❇️ Power of Attorney and Dementia: Planning for When It Strikes
• ❇️ The Importance of Estate Planning: Why It Matters in Protecting Your Legacy
• ❇️ Disinheriting your children in Scotland