As of Monday 17 November 2025, the price or ordering your family history probate documents via the government’s Find A Will service will increase from £1.50 to £16.00. That’s an eye-watering rise of almost 1000%.
The notice for this increase was published on 10 November in The Gazette, meaning for many it has been a mad rush to get those last minute orders in.
The rationale for this price rise, as stated in the Ministry of Justice’s (MOJ) Explanatory Memorandum, reads:
The estimated cost to His Majesty’s Courts and Tribunal Service (HMCTS) for providing single copies of documents under the Find A Will service equates to £16 per copy. The £1.50 fee therefore significantly under-recovers its cost, despite fees being set with the intention of full cost recovery. This statutory instrument will therefore increase the fee for users to obtain copies of documents within the Principal Registry of the Family Division, district registries and any sub-registries attached, which includes the “Find A Will” service and individual users requesting extra copies of probate grants from £1.50 to £16, to align more closely with costs and ensure that HMCTS can continue to deliver its services effectively.
The £1.50 charge was introduced in 2019, with prior to that the cost being £10, so a review was overdue. But I would love to know how they determined upon a flat rate £16 figure.
It means for many the cost of these documents for family and local history will be now prohibitively expensive, limiting future research. For example, at £16 each, there is no way would I be able to afford ordering all the World War One soldiers’ wills that I have for my Batley St. Mary of the Angels one-place study.
I’ve spent this past week ordering probate documents for clients to beat the rise. It included an order for 12 wills which cost £18. As of 17 November to place that same order will be £196.
Today I finally got round to reviewing my one-place study soldiers’ wills, confirming I’d already got them all.
I also reviewed my direct line ancestors, and placed an order for the six I identified as missing. Four came back instantly via an automated service, having already been digitised. This is akin to the service for World War One soldiers wills.
To my mind this begs the question why did the MOJ not introduce a graded pricing structure for probate records, similar to that in place for General Register Office (GRO) civil registration orders? The GRO’s automated Digital Image service has a lower cost of £3, with PDFs costing £8, and the more labour-intensive full certificates coming in at £12.50.
This seems a much fairer system than the flat rate fee, a system which might avoid pricing out family and local history researchers. For as the fee structure stands, there will be a dramatic cliff-edge drop off for probate orders going forward.
Postscript: The MoJ does still have a £1.50 bulk access option aimed at some (unspecified) organisations who access every copy of a grant of probate or will issued in England and Wales. By extension this means individual family and local history researchers are being overcharged for their documents, essentially subsidising these organisations. Hardly a fair system!
Because of work commitments, during October 2025 only one new post was added to the Batley St Mary of the Angels One-Place Study, bringing the total number of posts to 415.
This new post was the parish history snippets piece for October 2025. These snippets cover a variety of events and people from the parish from years gone by, and can be found in the Bulletin for Batley St Mary of the Angels and Birstall St Patrick section. Even if you have seen them on the Bulletin, it is worth checking them here as some have links to more detailed pieces I have written.
One of the reason for the lack of additions this month is because in November and December I’m giving a series of talks to various organisations. These include an online talk on 11 November 2025 to the Society of One-Place Studies about the early history of the Irish in Batley, and the parish of Batley St Mary of the Angels up until around the 1880s. This is restricted to members of the Society. However, on Monday 24 November I will be giving more or less the same talk at the Batley History Group meeting in Batley Town Hall. This starts with refreshments at 7pm, with the talk commencing at 7.30pm. It is open to both members (£2) and non-members (£4). So, perhaps I will see some of you there. More details about this, and Batley History Group’s other meetings in 2025/26 can be found here.
James Harkin, Batley’s 1st Catholic Mayor
I also have a special thank you this month for someone who has sent me a lovely letter and some photos of James Harkin, Batley’s first Catholic mayor – one of which is included in this piece. I don’t have her contact details to thank her personally, so hopefully she will read my thank you here.
Below is the full list of pages to date. I have annotated the *NEW* posts, so you can easily pick these out. Click on the link and it will take you straight to the relevant page.
If you want to know the background, and what is involved in a one-place study, click here. Otherwise read on, to discover a wealth of parish, parishioner and wider local Batley history.
Postscript: I may not be able to thank you personally because of your contact detail confidentiality, but I do want to say how much I appreciate the donations already received to keep this website going. They really and truly do help. Thank you.
The website has always been free to use, and I want to continue this policy in the future. However, it does cost me money to operate – from undertaking the research to website hosting costs. In the current difficult economic climate I do have to regularly consider if I can afford to continue running it as a free resource.
If you have enjoyed reading the various pieces, and would like to make a donation towards keeping the website up and running in its current open access format, it would be very much appreciated.
Please click 👉🏻here👈🏻 be taken to the PayPal donation link. By making a donation you will be helping to keep the website online and freely available for all.
Thank you.
As a professionally qualified genealogist, if you would like me to undertake any family, local or house history research for you do please get in touch. More information can be found on my research services page.
Finally, if you do have any information about, or photos of, parishioners from the period of the First World War please do get in touch. It does not have to be War Memorial men. It could be those who served and survived, or indeed any other men, women and children from the parish.
I would also be interested in information about, and photos of, those parishioners who were killed in World War Two, or others from the parish who undertook any war service and survived. This can be as broad as serving in the military, or work in munitions factories, the Land Army, even taking in refugees. This is an area I’m looking to develop in the future.
Past To Present Genealogy 