What to do when a TIAA account holder dies

For ERISA-covered employer plans (most 403(b) and 401(a) plans), if you are married and want to name anyone other than your spouse -- including your own revocable trust -- as primary beneficiary, your spouse must consent in writing. Under ERISA your spouse is entitled to at least 50% of death benefits unless that right is waived, and plans subject to the Qualified Joint and Survivor Annuity rules use a separate QJSA version of the beneficiary form. Your employer's plan document controls and can be stricter than TIAA's form, so a designation TIAA accepts can still be overridden by the plan at death. IRAs and non-qualified annuities generally do not require spousal consent, but TIAA's own F11468 warns residents of community property states (it lists AZ, CA, ID, LA, NV, NM, TX, WA, and WI among others) to get tax advice before designating a non-spouse for more than 50%, and its life insurance form (F1008) requires a NOTARY signature for community-property residents.

Not the retirement ones. TIAA employer plans (403(b), 401(a), 457(b)), IRAs, and the TIAA and CREF annuity contracts inside them cannot be retitled into a trust -- they are individual contracts, and an employer plan is governed by the plan document and ERISA rather than by your trust. For those, name the trust as BENEFICIARY on that account's designation form (supplying the trust name, date established, trustee, and EIN), and remember that on an ERISA plan naming the trust instead of your spouse still needs your spouse's written consent. Three TIAA products can actually be held in the trust's name: the brokerage account, using the Trustee Certification of Investment Powers form (F11071), which every trustee must sign and which asks for the trust's effective date, amendment date, type, and TIN; the TIAA-CREF Life insurance policy, whose beneficiary form (F1008) takes "the name of the trust, as policy owner" -- the ILIT route that keeps the death benefit out of your taxable estate; and the non-qualified annuity (F7737), which likewise accepts a trust as contract owner. On any trust-owned policy or contract, every trustee has to sign a change request.

TIAA has a no-login online Notification of Death form at https://www.tiaa.org/public/digitaltransactions/digital-death-notification -- anyone can file it, and it asks for the deceased's name, date of birth, Social Security number or TIAA account number (found on their quarterly statement), marital status, mailing address, and date of death, plus your name and relationship. Or call TIAA Beneficiary Services at 888-380-6428, weekdays 8am-7pm ET; this is the dedicated beneficiary line, not the general 800-842-2252 service number. TIAA then secures the accounts and stops ongoing annuity payments (which prevents overpayments beneficiaries would otherwise have to repay), contacts the beneficiaries of record, and sends illustrations of each share. For employer-plan participants, the plan administrator submits the Notification of Annuitant Death form (F9800) with the institution name and PPG code. Certified death certificate and claim forms go to TIAA, P.O. Box 1267, Charlotte, NC 28201-1267 (overnight: 8500 Andrew Carnegie Blvd., Charlotte, NC 28262); F9800 may be faxed to 800-914-8922.

No -- and this trips up executors. TIAA completed the sale of TIAA Bank on August 1, 2023; the bank now operates independently as EverBank, N.A. under its own national bank charter, with TIAA holding only a non-controlling stake. Deposit accounts, CDs, and mortgages that once said "TIAA Bank" are EverBank's today, and a death claim on them goes to EverBank, not to TIAA Beneficiary Services. The trust business did NOT go with the sale: it stayed with TIAA and operates as TIAA Trust, N.A. under a national trust bank charter, which is why TIAA IRAs and TIAA personal trust accounts still name TIAA Trust, N.A. on their forms. So a decedent with "TIAA" statements may have two separate institutions to settle: TIAA (retirement, annuities, brokerage, IRAs at TIAA Trust) and EverBank (banking).