A ray of hope announced last week for relatives waiting on paperwork essential for wills to be processed has one family sceptical of any improvement soon.

A statement issued on Wednesday by the Supreme Court acknowledged that a probate backlog to 2022 was being processed by court staff, with improvements to procedure to be “prioritised” and extra staff to be put on the job.

However, a man still without the death certificate required to initiate the probate process after his mother died in March 2023 told The Royal Gazette: “I have zero faith in them.”

Delays of months or years were reported by the Gazette as far back as 2020 — from a widow stuck three months as paperwork moved from the hospital’s pathologist to the Registry General, to a woman waiting a year for her brother’s death certificate.

The latest family to be delayed, who asked not to be identified, were also familiar with the experience reported in June 2023 of Kristina Ingham, widow of the martial arts master Frederick “Skipper” Ingham, who died in November 2022.

Mrs Ingham shared her story after waiting more than six months for her husband’s death certificate, which prevented her from accessing widow’s benefits.

The son said in the unnamed family said they had “shared our frustrations with this interminable process” with the Ingham family.

Mrs Ingham said last week that she had since received her documents, but added: “It took a long time, and they didn’t have any explanation why.

“It was irritating because in order to apply for widow’s benefits from the United States Government, because my husband was a US citizen as well, I had to make an application to the US embassy in London — and they will not do anything until you have the actual death certificate.

“At the time, various people said the same happened to them. For some, it was worse. Several people told me it took years.”

Mrs Ingham said she hoped the system would be reformed by the courts in collaboration with the Bermuda Bar Association.

“When somebody dies in your family, it’s a lot of agony as well as aggravation, and this type of thing seems so pointless.”

Walter Roban, the Minister of Home Affairs, told The House of Assembly in February that amendments were coming for the Registration of Births and Deaths Act 1949, including the introduction of a short-form death certificate.

A pledge to “revise and modernise” the procedure came in the Throne Speech of November 2023, with the Governor, Rena Lalgie, highlighting plans to amend “the Form E death certificate and in appropriate circumstances make provision for a short-form death certificate, which will allow for urgent estate matters to be settled”.

The Department of the Registry General, which issues death certificates, must be notified of a death by either a medical practitioner, hospital, funeral home or by the Coroner’s Office or a magistrate where an inquest into the cause of death is held.

The man who spoke last week with the Gazette said that his mother was “just shy of 78 when she passed”.

He added: “She was at home and in seemingly good health. I saw her a few hours before when I delivered her groceries. There was an autopsy but we do not have the results of that, either.”

He said the undertaker had been “a good advocate of our behalf, but has similarly been stymied”.

The son has pursued the matter through friends who worked at the hospital as surgeons, and who had blamed the Coroner’s Office.

However, that office does not process or sign death certificates.

The senior magistrate holds responsibility for the coroner’s department, and when Juan Wolffe was in the position he responded to complaints fielded in 2020 that his office typically processed information received within 48 hours of a report’s arrival from the hospital.

The Registry General also responded, saying it was unable to process an application or issue a death certificate until it received a death notice from either the coroner or Magistrates’ Court.

The man who spoke with the Gazette said that the only feedback he had received about the delay to his mother’s paperwork came in a letter near Christmas 2023 that blamed the delay on the cyberattack that knocked out government services last September — but his mother had been dead for six months before the attack.

He said the family’s lawyer is waiting to settle an estate consisting of “the family home and a handful of shares”.

The source said: “We would like to have some closure.

“Also, imagine if we weren’t in a position to manage the home personally. Bills still have to be paid. Maintenance and repairs have to be done. And if you have no access to accounts and can’t legally proceed with sales, rentals or renovations because of the probate state, what recourse is there?

“We are extremely fortunate to not have that financial problem, but I would bet many more are not as fortunate. Surely, the state of abandoned properties is linked to the protracted probate process. I know of others that are five or more years and still unsettled.”

On Wednesday, the Supreme Court said that “urgent applications” filed since 2023 were being addressed within three weeks of gaining approval to be expedited.

A statement issued by the court said a Probate User Committee had been tasked with finding “ways to increase the efficiency of processing applications once the backlog is cleared”.

Delayed applications dating to December 31, 2022 were to be addressed by this November 30 “at the latest”.

However, the man waiting on his mother’s death certificate said that improvements had been promised as far back as 2020, such as the Pathologist’s Office at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital vowing to improve communications with the Coroner’s Office.

He said: “As for government action, they have been promising things for ever and there’s zero evidence of movement. They are either unwilling to do things or incapable of doing them.

“All that will happen is time will pass and costs will go up.”