How to review an existing trust in ten questions

If you want to review an existing trust, the most useful work happens before any adviser is hired. A trust that has run for years usually drifts: people retire, families move, banks change their rules, and the deed that once matched your intentions slowly stops matching reality. A short self-audit shows you where the gaps are, and it makes any later professional review faster and more focused.

This guide gives you ten questions about the trust and, above all, about the trustee who administers it. They are grouped by risk area, so you can see at a glance whether your concern sits with the deed, the records, the people involved or the oversight around the trustee. You need only two documents to begin: the trust deed with all its amendments, and the accounts of the most recent years.

The guide is general information. Which answers matter, and what you can do about them, depends on the governing law of the trust, your residence, where the beneficiaries live and the nature of the assets. An individual analysis is always needed before you act.

Why a self-audit comes before a formal review

An independent review is a serious exercise: a full reading of the deed, the records and the tax position. It works best when the person commissioning it already knows what they are worried about. Arriving with a list of precise questions saves time and avoids the common outcome in which a reviewer produces a long report that never touches your real concern.

A self-audit also protects you from two opposite mistakes. The first is complacency: assuming that a trust which has produced no complaints is in good order. Silence is not evidence of good administration. The second is overreaction: replacing a trustee because a distribution was slow or a letter went unanswered, when the underlying issue was an ambiguous clause in the deed.

If you are weighing whether to stay or move, the page on switching trustee or staying and fixing the relationship sets out how those two paths differ. The self-audit below feeds directly into that decision.

Start with two documents

The trust deed and everything attached to it

The trust deed is the constitution of the trust. Read it with a pencil. Mark every clause that grants a power, restricts a power or names a person. Then look for the documents that sit around it: deeds of appointment and retirement, amendments, any letter of wishes, and any written decisions of the trustee that changed how the trust works.

The legal frame is the same in every case. Under the Hague Convention on the law applicable to trusts, a trust is a legal relationship in which assets are placed under the control of a trustee for the benefit of a beneficiary or for a specified purpose. The assets form a separate fund, they stand in the name of the trustee, and the trustee has the duty to manage them and to account for them. The Convention also says that powers reserved by the settlor, or the trustee being one of the beneficiaries, are not incompatible with a trust existing. In other words, the foundation for the questions that follow is that the trustee must manage and must account, and a deed that blurs either duty deserves attention.

The accounts of the most recent years

Accounts show what the deed cannot: what actually happened. Take the accounts of the last few years and read them in sequence rather than one at a time. You are looking for movement you cannot explain, items that appear and vanish, loans, distributions without a recorded decision, and any change in the way assets are valued or described.

You do not need to be an accountant. You need to be able to follow one asset from one year to the next, and to find the decision that explains each significant change. If you cannot, that is already a finding.

The ten questions at a glance

The diagram groups the questions by risk area. A higher mark means that, in many trusts, the area deserves closer reading; it is a qualitative impression to guide your attention, not a measurement of your own trust.

The table below turns the same grouping into a working tool. For each question it shows what you are testing and the document that will answer it.

Area one: the deed and the powers

Question one: do the powers in the deed still fit your family and your assets?

Deeds are written for a moment. Definitions of beneficiaries may refer to a class that has since changed: a marriage, a divorce, a birth, a death, a child who has become an adult. Investment powers may have been drafted when the trust held a single type of asset and be silent on what it holds now. Administrative powers may not cover digital holdings, a company the family has since acquired, or property in another country.

The questions that expose out-of-date powers are practical ones. Does the deed allow what the trustee is actually doing today? Does it forbid something the family now needs? Does it name a person who has died, moved or lost capacity? Does it refer to a bank or an adviser who no longer acts?

Example: a family based in Lausanne set up a trust when their assets were mostly a family company. Years later the company was sold and the proceeds were invested in a broad portfolio and some property. The deed still described the trustee's investment role in terms of the company shares. Nothing was wrong in practice, but nobody could say with confidence whether the current investments fell within the trustee's powers. That uncertainty is exactly what a self-audit is meant to surface. The example is an illustration, not a real case.

Question two: who holds reserved powers, and are they being used as intended?

Reserved powers are powers the settlor keeps rather than handing them to the trustee. The Hague Convention accepts that they can coexist with a valid trust, so their presence is not a defect. The risk lies in how they are used and in what the deed says about them. See the entry on reserved powers and the guide on settlor reserved powers and the trustee relationship for the practical side.

Ask three things. Which powers are reserved, and by whom? Have they ever been exercised, and if so, is there a written trace? Is the trustee still administering in a way consistent with the idea that it holds the assets and must account for them, or has the trustee in practice become an executor of instructions? A trust where every significant decision is dictated by one person can raise questions about whether the trustee is truly doing the job the law describes.

Question three: who can remove the trustee, and who can appoint the next one?

This is the question most owners have never checked. Read the clause on retirement, removal and appointment of trustees. Identify the person or body that can act: the settlor, the protector, a majority of adult beneficiaries, a court, or nobody. Then ask whether that person is alive, reachable and still the right holder of the power.

A trust in which the removal power belongs to someone who has died, or to a protector no one can identify, is a trust in which a failing trustee cannot easily be replaced. The process itself is described in changing trustee step by step, and the documents you will need are listed in documents to gather before changing trustee. Knowing the route in advance is worth far more than discovering it in a dispute.

Area two: records and money

Question four: is every significant decision written down with its reasons?

A discretionary power is not only a right to decide; it is a duty to consider properly. The evidence of proper consideration is the record: minutes, resolutions, or at least a written note stating what was decided, by whom, on what information and why. Ask for the decisions behind the last few distributions, the last change of investment approach and any loan.

Gaps are common and are not always a sign of bad faith. Some trustees decide in meetings and document them late; some rely on emails. But a trust without a decision record is hard to defend if a beneficiary challenges a distribution, and hard for a successor to understand. The case an independent review reveals missing minutes shows what this looks like in practice.

Question five: can you follow the assets from one year to the next?

Take the opening and closing position of two consecutive years and trace each asset. Every item should either still be there, have been sold with a recorded reason, or have been transferred under a documented decision. Look at valuation methods: a change in the method between years needs an explanation. Look at inter-company or related-party balances, which are the most frequent source of confusion.

If the trust holds structures underneath it, such as companies or a foundation, ask whether the accounts show them clearly or merely give a single line. The question of how a trustee operates inside such arrangements is covered in trustee in combined structures.

Question six: who controls the bank accounts and on whose instructions?

The Hague Convention places the title to trust assets in the name of the trustee. In practice, you should be able to see which bank accounts belong to the trust, in whose name they are held, who is authorised to sign and who may give instructions. Check that no account in the personal name of the settlor or a family member is in reality a trust asset, and that no trust asset sits in an account that the trustee does not control.

Pay attention to powers of attorney granted to advisers or family members, and to whether they are recorded and reviewed. The page on your trustee and the trust bank accounts explains how this normally works, including the way banks treat the trustee and the beneficial owner for anti-money-laundering purposes under AMLA.

Area three: people and information

Question seven: are beneficiaries and the protector given the information they are entitled to?

Information rights depend on the governing law and the deed. Some trusts give beneficiaries wide access to accounts; others limit it. What you can check without a lawyer is whether the trustee has a consistent approach: do beneficiaries get periodic reports, are protector consents requested properly, are answers given in a reasonable time? See what information your trustee must give you for the broader picture.

If adult beneficiaries have never seen anything, ask why. It may be intentional, in line with the deed and the settlor's wishes. It may also be a sign that nobody has looked. If a protector exists, check whether the protector's powers are used or dormant. A protector who has never been consulted may be a protector who has been forgotten.

Question eight: is the trustee neutral, and are conflicts managed?

Neutrality matters most where the interests of beneficiaries diverge: a second marriage, children from different relationships, a beneficiary who needs support while another expects capital. Ask whether the trustee has dealings with related parties, such as companies of the family in which the trustee or its group has an interest, and whether those dealings are on documented, reasonable terms.

Also ask whether the trustee has ever refused an instruction and explained why. A trustee that never says no may not be exercising independent judgement. The situation of blended families and trustee neutrality is a good illustration of why this question is not theoretical.

Area four: oversight and continuity

Question nine: is the trustee properly approved and supervised?

In Switzerland, professional trustees are subject to the Financial Institutions Act (FinIA, or LEFin in French). Under FinIA, a supervised trustee is audited each year by an audit firm within the meaning of the Financial Market Supervision Act. FINMA publishes a list of authorised supervisory organisations and a list of institutions it supervises directly, including Swiss group companies under FinIA. You can use those public lists to check the status of the entity that administers your trust.

Checking the status is quick; interpreting it is not. A supervised trustee is not a promise of a good outcome, and supervision does not replace your own attention to how your trust is run. The guide on what FINMA and SO-FIT approval means for you explains the difference between the regulatory status and the quality of service you receive. Also ask the trustee how its compliance obligations are handled in your case, including reporting under CRS and AEOI where relevant; the page on compliance and reporting duties covers what to expect.

Question ten: what happens if the trustee is not there?

A trustee can be an individual who falls ill, retires or dies, or a company that is sold, merged or restructured. Ask what the deed says about a successor trustee, whether anyone has been named, and what internal arrangements the firm has when a key person leaves. Ask who knows the file, and where the originals of the deed, the minutes and the bank documentation are stored.

Continuity is the question owners most often put off, because nothing seems urgent until it is. If the trustee is an individual, the situation described in your individual trustee has died or retired is a useful rehearsal. For the planning side, see continuity planning when the trustee is not there.

Scoring your answers

You do not need a numerical score. For each question, note one of three states in your own words: clear, unclear, or missing. Clear means you found the answer in the documents. Unclear means the documents point in different directions or are silent. Missing means the document that should answer it is not in your file.

Patterns matter more than individual answers. A few unclear points, mostly in the deed, usually call for a deed review. Missing records and unexplained movements in the accounts point to an administration problem, and that is a conversation to have with the trustee. A trust that cannot explain who can remove the trustee, combined with silence from the trustee, is a more serious case and is discussed in replacing a failing trustee.

Be careful about conclusions. An unclear clause is not proof of wrongdoing, and a missing minute is not proof that no decision was made. The aim of the self-audit is to produce a precise list of points to verify, not a verdict.

What to do with your list

There are three sensible next steps, in rising order of weight.

1. Ask the trustee. Many gaps are documentary and are closed with a simple request. Put the questions in writing, one point at a time, and ask for dated answers. A trustee that responds clearly and promptly is giving you useful information about the relationship.
2. Commission an independent review. If the answers are unclear, or if the trustee is part of the problem, a review by someone with no stake in the outcome is the logical step. The page on independent review of an existing trust and its trustee describes what that involves.
3. Change or add a trustee. This is the last resort and should follow the analysis, not precede it.

A short checklist to take away

• Gather the deed, all amendments, and any letter of wishes
• Gather the accounts of recent years and the matching bank statements
• Mark every clause that grants, limits or names a person for a power
• Identify who can remove and appoint the trustee, and whether they are reachable
• Find the written reasoning for recent distributions and investment changes
• Trace two or three major assets across consecutive years
• List who can sign on each bank account and who can instruct the bank
• Check the trustee's approval and supervision status on the public lists
• Find out who would step in if the trustee were unavailable
• Write down every point you could not resolve, in plain words

For a regular rhythm, the annual trust health check turns the same reflex into a yearly routine, so that you never again face a trust that nobody has looked at for years.