Skype, FaceTime and email will be used by solicitors to draw up wills for their clients because of Covid-19 restrictions.
This is a new departure for Irish law as traditionally clients would have drawn up their wills at their solicitor's office.
These changes are part of recommendations made in a circular sent to solicitors throughout Ireland and comes as there is a surge in the number of people making wills.
The recommendations advise solicitors how they should provide those legal services safely in the current environment.
The President of the Law Society of Ireland, Michele O’Boyle, issued the letter and said the measures are a "totally new departure".
"It’s a completely new departure because heretofore traditionally the client would always have attended the solicitors office and the solicitor would have talked through the instructions, made a note of those instructions, discussed various options," Ms O’Boyle said.
"We are taking detailed instructions by telephone and sometimes by email. This is a totally new departure."
The changes come in response to the Covid-19 pandemic and were published as part of guidance measures encouraging solicitors to use email and Skype when wills are being drawn up and executed have been issued by the Law Society of Ireland.
It is a guidance for making wills during the Covid-19 emergency and sets out how solicitors can draft and execute wills whilst adhering to social distancing, cocooning and self-isolation.
The guidelines are an attempt by legal practitioners to "continue to provide legal services in an utterly changed environment" and to "continue to serve" communities all over Ireland.
Some measures include the use of Skype, FaceTime, and email, whilst others involve wills being signed through windows or in open spaces.
The letter states that it is outlining "guidelines only and each individual solicitor must take cognisance of his or her own individual circumstances, taking into account themselves, their family members and the family members of staff who may be vulnerable to the virus".
When the solicitor is taking instructions from the client, the letter states "instructions should be taken over the phone and the draft will sent to the client by email for approval and amendment before any decision is taken in relation to the execution of the will".
It also states "it is not appropriate to take any prolonged instructions in a room with anyone and in particular an elderly person, as it would expose that person, as well as you and your employees".
The letter also advices how a will can be executed.
It states: "The Succession Act, 1965 is perfectly clear on this and the will must be signed or their signature acknowledged by the testator in the (physical) presence of witnesses who must then sign in the presence of the testator. Both witnesses have to be present when the testator signs but they do not have to sign in the presence of each other, so a suitable distance can be maintained at all times".
It outlines procedures if clients want to attend the solicitor's office, and if the solicitor needs to attend the client’s home.
If the solicitor is travelling to the testator’s (the person making the will) home, the letter suggests, the solicitor and the witness travel separately.
It also suggests "the client could organise a witness such as a neighbour to be there to witness the will along with" the solicitor.
It outlines a "desk or similar writing surface placed in front of a window", that the will should be posted through the letterbox, so the client can execute the will, witnessed by the solicitor and the other witness through the window.
It adds that "if necessary the client can hold the will up to the window and sign it there".
Alternatively, if the client is sitting in their car when the solicitor arrives, they can sign on the dashboard of their car witnessed by the solicitor and the other witness – who can sign on the bonnet of the car while maintaining a social distance.
It adds the solicitor should "consider keeping the will in a separate envelope for at least three days to reduce the possibility of viral transmission".
Another scenario involves using Skype or FaceTime.
The solicitor can post the will out to the client who will then organise their own two independent witnesses.
The letter adds if the "client has broadband and WiFi, it may be helpful if they were to Skype or FaceTime" the solicitor’s office "while attending to the execution of the will".
Professor John Mee from the University College Cork’s Law School says that the changes could go further.
He told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland programme there is a possibility that solicitors may need more changes as the Covid-19 emergency develops.
He said he would not see the guidelines as "particularly radical".
"In particular, I guess, because the President of the Law Society - or the Law Society - can’t change the actual rules. They can’t change the law. They are advising solicitors on the limits of the current law and how they can best conform to that," Professor Mee said.
"I think that if matters get even more serious, and even more radical move would be to allow no witnesses at all to be needed," Professor Mee said.
"That has been mooted in England and Wales where they do have a category of privileged will whereby a soldier, or sailor, in active service can make a will without the need for any witnesses.
"I guess if someone is very ill and in isolation in an ICU ward there might be no other way for them to make a will," said Professor Mee.
Ms O’Boyle said Covid-19 has "caused people to pause and reflect on their own mortality".
"There has certainly been a surge in the number of people wishing to make a will or update and existing will," she said.
Ms O’Boyle confirmed she was seeing "a surge" in people making wills at her legal practice in Sligo.
"In fact, this morning, in my own office in Sligo, two existing wills were updated," she said.
