Spouse Deposit Checks Payable to Deceased Spouse?

Only if the bank allows it, and it would be wrong to do so.

At the moment of the one owner's death, the previously joint account becomes by contract with the bank and by state law an account owned by the surviving owner. So depositing a check payable to the decedent into the account would be the same as depositing a check payable to John Burnett into an account in the name of Ken Golliher.

Checks payable to the decedent can properly be deposited only to an account of the decedent's estate, which would include an account that was formerly owned by the decedent as a sole owner or an account established in the name of the estate by its court-appointed personal representative.

First published on BankersOnline.com 2/13/12