Trustees can do a number of different things, but an easy way to describe what they do would be that they are fiduciaries who oversee the day to day management of assets placed in a trust. A trustee doesn’t have to be an individual. A trustee can be a company, such as a bank, and need not be a beneficiary of the trust.
Most grantors of revocable trusts serve as the trustees themselves, administering the assets placed in trust while they are alive. A successor trustee takes over that revocable trust if the initial trustee dies or becomes incapacitated. With irrevocable trusts, however, the grantor cannot serve as the trustee. An individual or institution has to take over in trust administration at that point. Successor trustees and irrevocable trust trustees have the same duties despite the different titles.
Regardless of title, the trustee has the duty of a fiduciary. The trustee has the duty as a fiduciary to act in the best interests of the trust beneficiaries. The trust agreement may spell out in more detail exactly what the trustee has to do for the beneficiaries, such as be releasing funds for specific reasons. Revocable trust grantors who serve as their own trustees do not have to worry about breaching a fiduciary duty because it can be dissolved or altered at any time by that grantor. Learn more about trustees.
But what happens if a trustee violates their fiduciary duty? How can the beneficiaries recover for any lost trust assets due to this breach? Trustee bonds protect the beneficiaries of the trust.
The trustee bond protects the interests of trust beneficiaries
Colonial Surety offers the direct and digital way to obtain trustee bonds. We are the insurance company — which means no agent, no broker, and no middleman. We make it easy to obtain your court bond instantly. The steps are easy — get a quote online, fill out your information, satisfy underwriting requirements, and enter your payment method. Print or e-file your bond from your office. It’s that simple!