This depends on how you learned that you had become a heir to a testator who was living in abroad at the time of his death. If you received a so-called "letter of happiness" promising a multimillion-dollar inheritance from abroad by e-mail or as an online message, simply ignore and delete the message. This is a typical case of fraud.

If you received an official notice by mail with documents confirming the sender's legitimacy, such as a power of attorney or a court order to find heirs, then the next step is to check the validity by reading this letter carefully!

It is a mandatory requirement that the letter contains a description of the relationship with the testator, specifying specific names and dates so that they can be verified. If the letter simply says "your cousin Bob from Latin American died and left you $10 million", it is probably a fraud, after which you will be asked to pay in advance for a lawyer so that you can get an inheritance that you will never see. Such a letter can go into the rubbish bin immediately!

In order to make sure that you are not deceived, you can use the services of a lawyer who will check the sender's authority, whether the company is registered, whether the inheritance case referred to in the letter exists, and whether the terms of the fees agreement are appropriate.

The conditions for the provision of services in obtaining an inheritance must be mutually beneficial!!

• They are mutually beneficial when you are not required to pay in advance or if the payment is not substantial,
• The scope of services is specifically discussed in the contract. This may be, for example, the search for the hereditary mass, the establishment of all legal heirs or heirs by will, the demand for documents proving kinship, etc.,
• The exact amount of the fee is specified,
• This amount shall not exceed 33.3% of the inherited property, i.e. it shall not exceed one third of the inheritance and shall be paid only if successful and at the end of the case.

The opinion, that the greater the number of heirs, the higher the fee, is usually not true. The cost of the fee depends on the complexity of the search, the amount of initial information, the time spent on research and the costs associated with it. This is usually the case when the heirs are several generations away from the testator, when they live abroad and when the documents have been destroyed through war or repressions. In that case a high fee percentage is justified.

Such cases can take from several months to several years, depending on the complexity of the case.

You can contribute to making the procedure faster by taking an active part in it. At the request of researchers, you can provide documents, either in the original or notarised copies. You can also search family albums and letters for information about relatives and provide them to the researchers, and you can issue a power of attorney to the civil registry offices, archives and other institutions to request documents on your behalf.

Of course, this option is possible, but it might be very long and may not lead to the desired outcome. In order to correctly formalise the right to inherit, you need the detailed work of lawyers and historians, perhaps knowledge of foreign languages, and often the search for people by detectives. In order to issue an inheritance, you will need to establish and prove not only your rights, but also the entire inheritance community, which belongs to a certain line by law. The absence of only one heir makes it possible to challenge the certificate of right to inheritance and the withdrawal of the share paid. It might be in your interest to trust specialists and get qualified help.