What to do when a Lili account holder dies

Section 7.4 of the Sunrise Banks Account Agreement sets two windows. First, Lili may continue to honor items until it both knows of the death and has had a reasonable opportunity to act on that knowledge — so the account stays fully live until you tell them. Second, even once Lili knows, it may pay items drawn on or before the date of death for up to ten (10) days after that date, unless someone claiming an interest in the account orders a stop payment. If the decedent had outstanding checks or recurring ACH debits, notifying Lili is not enough: state that you are a person claiming an interest in the account and ask for a stop payment. Section 7.5 adds a further wrinkle — until Lili receives the appropriate court documents, it may keep processing transactions even after an unofficial notification of an adverse claim, and the claimant indemnifies it for losses if it does. In short, a phone call reports the death; court documentation is what actually stops the money.

Yes, and this is the most common way an estate loses a fintech balance. Under section 7.3 of the Sunrise Banks Account Agreement, any account with a balance and no customer-initiated activity for twelve continuous months may be treated as inactive or dormant under state unclaimed-property law, is frozen, and the funds are transferred to the state as required. Customer-initiated activity includes transfers, mobile deposits, ACH activity, service calls, and even simply logging into the app — none of which will happen once the owner has died. A dormant-account fee also applies while the balance sits there, and on the paid tiers the monthly plan fee ($15, $35, or $55) keeps accruing against the balance until the account is closed. Lili accounts are also easy to overlook in an inventory: there are no branches, no paper statements arriving in the mail, and the account may exist only inside a phone app. Executors settling a freelancer's or solopreneur's estate should check for a Lili account early. If a year has already passed, the money is not gone, but you will be filing an unclaimed-property claim with the state rather than a claim with the bank.

More parties than the Lili brand suggests. Lili App Inc. is a financial technology company, not a bank; the account itself is provided by Sunrise Banks, N.A., Member FDIC, with Lili acting as program manager and service provider. Balances above $246,500 are swept nightly out of the Sunrise account into Sweep Accounts at other FDIC-insured banks under the deposit sweep program, which is how the advertised $3 million of FDIC coverage is achieved — so an executor should ask Lili for the sweep-bank breakdown rather than recording one Sunrise balance on the inventory. Wire transfers run through Column Bank N.A., Member FDIC (routing 121145307), so an outgoing wire to close out the estate clears through Column. And if the decedent held a Lili BusinessBuild Card, that is a debt owed to CapitalOS as lender, with the card issued by First Internet Bank of Indiana — a separate counterparty that notifying Lili does not settle. FDIC insurance itself continues to protect the deceased owner's funds during estate administration, calculated for six months after death as though the depositor were still alive.