Susan Johnson was told by hospital staff she had died four months earlier as she waited for a scan.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/20347898

Archive/mirror: https://archive.ph/1pl5L

Mrs Johnson, from Scarborough, attended her hospital appointment in March 2023.

The mother-of-two said: "I gave them my letter and their first words were, ‘ooh you’re dead’.

"I said, ‘pardon?’. I was in shock.

…

The retired housekeeper contacted her GP and was told the mistake had been fixed.

However, when she contacted the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) the bemused call handler told her: “On the computer you’re dead”.

"I said, ‘I’m not, I’m still talking to you’.

  • @[email protected]English
    21•7 months ago

    Being declared dead can have a lot of consequences, especially financially. I’d be shaking.

    • @EtherWhack
      16•7 months ago

      …in frustration and anger.

      To explain a bit, institutions will likely freeze all your accounts (including your money) until the mistake is “officially” corrected. This means without family or a friend to help, you can easily get stuck.

      • FlaxEnglish
        3•7 months ago

        The institutions should be prepared for this happening though

        • @EtherWhack
          6•7 months ago

          It would be tricky as they can only release them with an official correction, which can take time.

          One of the biggest reasons they would freeze them is for fraud prevention. If there is any activity on an account when a person is supposed to be dead, it would indicate something is awry and it’s their duty to prevent it.

        • TWeaKEnglish
          2•7 months ago

          They are, that’s why they freeze things first and only proceed when they get a copy of the death certificate. Someone has to give them the death certificate, which is why nothing happened here for 4 months.

          For bank accounts, this means you can’t withdraw their money until it’s gone through probate. However, if it’s a joint account then the surviving account holder can still use the account as normal. However if no one’s pushing for probate (and without death certificates) nothing much will happen for a while.

          This is why it’s a bit of a non-story, nothing major happened ultimately, nothing was likely to happen soon (her carer’s payments stopped temporarily but it sounds like she didn’t realise until after the hospital appointment), and if anything the most surprising thing is that it took the “dead” person 4 months to even notice the mistake.

    • @bitchkatEnglish
      3•7 months ago

      the article says she lost a government payment she was receiving for a few a months.