What to do when a First Savings account holder dies

The balance belongs to the surviving owner or owners, as joint tenants with survivorship rather than tenants in common.¹

On a joint account with no survivorship (tenants in common), the deceased owner's share does not pass to the other owner and is handled through the estate.¹

On a Revocable Trust or In Trust For account under the Indiana terms, the beneficiary can withdraw once all the persons who created the account have died and the beneficiary is then living. Multiple surviving beneficiaries take equal shares without survivorship.¹

The Indiana terms offer a Pay-on-Death account with or without LDPS. With LDPS, a beneficiary who died first is replaced by that beneficiary's lineal descendants per stirpes who survive all the account creators.¹

Without LDPS, a beneficiary who died first drops out and the share is reallocated among the surviving primary beneficiaries in proportion to their shares, or to the surviving contingent beneficiaries if no primary survives. With no surviving beneficiary, the funds belong to the owner's estate.¹

The account terms state that an early withdrawal penalty may be imposed on a time account even where the holder did not initiate the withdrawal, and they state no death exception. The penalty terms are in the separately provided notice of penalty for early withdrawal.¹

The named beneficiary presents the death certificate and completes the custodian's distribution paperwork.²

Legacy First Savings mortgages, which go to the servicer rather than the bank's deposit line³

Trust and estate administration, guardianships, trusts, and IRAs⁴

"You agree to notify us promptly if any person with a right to withdraw funds from your account(s) dies."¹

The bank may keep honoring checks, items, and instructions until it knows of the death and has had a reasonable opportunity to act.¹

The bank "may pay or certify checks drawn on or before the date of death ... for up to ten (10) days after your death ... unless ordered to stop payment by someone claiming an interest in the account."¹

The bank may place an administrative hold on the funds when the account becomes subject to a claim adverse to the account holder's interest, to others claiming an interest as survivors or beneficiaries, or arising by operation of law.¹

IRAs, credit-card debt, and accounts where the right of withdrawal arises only in a representative capacity are excluded from the bank's right of setoff, which protects a deceased person's IRA and an executor's estate account from being taken against a loan.¹

Under the Indiana terms, how each account is titled on the account record, not the will, determines who is paid.¹

First Savings Bank merged into First Merchants Bank effective February 1, 2026, and a legacy First Savings account is governed by First Merchants' Terms and Conditions of Your Account. First Merchants tells First Savings customers to keep using their First Savings services until a "conversion later in 2026".⁵