When you review your Will, you might wonder:
"What happens if one of the people I named dies before me? Why doesn't the Will explicitly say 'if Person A dies, their share goes to Person B and Person C'?"
Don't worry—your Will is designed using a modern, reliable legal concept called Floating Shares. It handles these situations automatically without needing pages of confusing legal fine print.
How Platform Selections Work
Primary Beneficiaries: Once you select the option for a deceased primary beneficiary’s share to "go to the remaining surviving beneficiaries," that is the exact Floating Shares logic your Will follows.
Contingent (Backup) Beneficiaries: You cannot select what happens to individual contingent shares. By default, the system automatically applies Floating Shares logic to all contingent beneficiaries if they pass away.
1. What Are "Floating Shares"? (The Pie Concept)
Instead of dividing your estate into locked-in percentages (like 50% or 25%) that leave empty gaps if someone dies, your Will divides your estate into "parts".
Think of it like a freshly baked pie: we only slice the pie for people who are alive to receive it. If a beneficiary passes away before you, their slice isn't baked at all—the entire pie is simply sliced into fewer pieces and shared fairly among the survivors.
2. Step-by-Step Example
Let's look at an estate split among three primary beneficiaries:
Person A: 50 parts (if surviving)
Person B: 25 parts (if surviving)
Person C: 25 parts (if surviving)
Scenario A: Everyone is alive when you pass away
The Executor adds up all parts for living beneficiaries: 50 + 25 + 25 = 100 total parts.
Beneficiary | Status | Parts Received | Final Share |
Person A | Living | 50 out of 100 | 50% (Half) |
Person B | Living | 25 out of 100 | 25% (One-quarter) |
Person C | Living | 25 out of 100 | 25% (One-quarter) |
Scenario B: Person C passes away before you
Because Person C did not survive you, they receive 0 parts under the rule "if they survive me". The pool recalculates using only living beneficiaries: 50 + 25 + 0 = 75 total parts.
Beneficiary | Status | Parts Received | Final Share |
Person A | Living | 50 out of 75 | 66.7% (Two-thirds) |
Person B | Living | 25 out of 75 | 33.3% (One-third) |
Person C | Passed Away | 0 parts | 0% |
Notice: Person A still receives twice as much as Person B (50 vs 25 parts). The original balance between survivors is preserved automatically!
3. Why Extra Clauses Aren't Needed
You don't need a separate clause explicitly saying "If Person C dies, give their share to Person A and B" because of two key legal mechanisms in the document:
"If they survive me" / "If living": Acts as a filter so deceased individuals yield 0 parts.
"Number of equal parts required": Allows the denominator pool to shrink automatically, assigning 100% of the estate to living members with zero unallocated funds.
4. How Contingent (Backup) Beneficiaries Work
If all primary beneficiaries pass away, your estate moves to your contingent backup list. While you can customize primary beneficiary choices, you cannot select custom settings for contingents; instead, the system automatically applies this exact Floating Shares logic.
If one contingent beneficiary passes away, their share automatically floats to the remaining living contingent beneficiaries in proportion to their allocated parts.