Estate planning at Morgan Stanley
How to protect 14 Morgan Stanley accounts — manage beneficiaries in-branch, fund a trust in-branch, and file claims through Morgan Stanley's Financial Advisor / servicing branch (Client Relations for escalation)
Morgan Stanley account support
Financial Advisor / servicing branch (Client Relations for escalation)
Escalations only: Morgan Stanley Client Relations, PO Box 95002, South Jordan, UT 84095. Account-specific forms and requests must be mailed to the servicing branch (address on the account statement) or to E*TRADE.
Servicing branch and Financial Advisor (the deceased's branch number is on the account statement)
Morgan Stanley offers 14 consumer investment accounts that interact with estate planning in distinct ways. Of those, 13 can name a trust as beneficiary or be retitled into a trust. Understanding the transfer methods available for each account type helps families keep assets out of probate and ensure they pass to the right people.
Morgan Stanley lets account holders update beneficiary designations in branch, by mail, and by phone, typically taking 15-30 minutes to complete; processing typically within 1-2 weeks. Trust funding is also available, allowing families to retitle brokerage accounts into a trust.
There are two sides to estate planning at Morgan Stanley: setting things up while you're alive, and the process survivors follow after a death.
Preparing your estate
Beneficiaries and trust funding
How to update beneficiaries in-branch, fund a trust in-branch, and review 14 account types at Morgan Stanley.
View details →When someone dies
Death claim process
Contact Morgan Stanley's Financial Advisor / servicing branch (Client Relations for escalation) to file a claim. 7-step process, 7 required documents, and contact information for survivors.
View details →Morgan Stanley's Financial Advisor / servicing branch (Client Relations for escalation) can answer questions about beneficiaries, trusts, or death claims at 1-866-227-2256.
Frequently asked questions
With the brand on the account, not with the parent company. E*TRADE from Morgan Stanley is still a distinct brand with its own estate team: E*TRADE Beneficiary Services at 888-402-0653 (Mon-Fri 9:00am-7:00pm ET), reached through us.etrade.com, and Morgan Stanley's own Client Relations page lists a separate E*TRADE telephone line at 800-387-2331. An advisor-led Morgan Stanley Wealth Management account is settled by the Financial Advisor and the servicing branch instead — the branch telephone number is printed on the account statement, with 888-454-3965 (Mon-Fri 8:00am-7:00pm ET) as the general line. An employer stock plan account is a third path, handled by Global Stock Plan Services at 800-367-4777. Calling the wrong one of the three costs time: each has its own forms and its own mailing address.
No, and the firm says so in its own disclosure: "Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC does not accept appointments nor will it act as a trustee but it will provide access to trust services through an appropriate third-party corporate trustee." What Morgan Stanley offers instead is an open-architecture Trust Services platform: dedicated Trust Specialists work with your Financial Advisor to select a corporate trustee partner, and the platform also covers Executor Services, Agent for Trustee arrangements, and trustee oversight. The trust services themselves are provided by third parties that are not affiliated with Morgan Stanley. Practically, that means the trustee named in your trust document has to be an individual or an outside trust company, while Morgan Stanley continues to custody and manage the assets. If you already hold a trust-titled account here, your successor trustee settles it with the branch, not with a Morgan Stanley trust department.
Sources
Data sourced from Morgan Stanley primary sources (15 pages reviewed). How we research.
Morgan Stanley account support
Financial Advisor / servicing branch (Client Relations for escalation)
Escalations only: Morgan Stanley Client Relations, PO Box 95002, South Jordan, UT 84095. Account-specific forms and requests must be mailed to the servicing branch (address on the account statement) or to E*TRADE.
Servicing branch and Financial Advisor (the deceased's branch number is on the account statement)
Estate planning articles
Learn how to protect your Morgan Stanley accounts and other assets with trusts, beneficiary designations, and estate planning documents.
